A Rather Unusual Holidays
by Sarah Liz B
Summary: A visit to the Dursleys. A dinner with family and friends. A "Ministry-approved" surprise brought over by Teddy Lupin. What happens when the Next Gen set it off, thus playing a well-loved musical? One thing is certain: "A VERY POTTER WHAT?"
1. Prologue

**Author's Note: Hi there! My name is Sarah Liz B and this is my first fanfic, designed to let myself dip my toes into the water before I jump straight in :D. The idea is pretty much a "Next Gen watch AVPM" fic, which I haven't seen much of here. This chapter, the prologue, doesn't actually have anything from the play: that's what the chapters are for! :)**

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling. I know that because if it belonged to me, I would've kept it going. A Very Potter Musical belongs to StarKid! I know that because if I was in it, you'd know. :D See a name you don't recognise? They're the ones who are mine. :)**

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><p><strong>A Rather Unusual Holidays<strong>

* * *

><p><strong>Prologue<strong>

* * *

><p>It was a cold, wet day in late December as a family of five piled into their car. To the ordinary, unsuspecting eye, they looked like any normal family: a man with untidy jet black hair, his sons (who shared the same feature), and his wife and daughter, both of whom had flaming red hair. The sons argued with each other and the daughter also looked rather unhappy, as though some form of injustice had been forced upon her. The truth, however, was that they were rather unusual, even within the society to which they belonged.<p>

The married couple were Harry and Ginevra "Ginny" Potter, Wizarding war veterans famous for their participation in the Battle of Hogwarts some twenty-five years prior, although Harry held the particular distinction of defeating the dark wizard, Lord Voldemort. Harry and Ginny had three teenage children, also Wizarding: James, Albus and Lily.

The old Anglia turned left at a roundabout and continued on to its destination, passing through an exit that led to another motorway. The three teenagers in the back seat continued to speak their protests, the girl being the loudest of the lot.

"But Dad," whined Lily Potter, "I don't _want_ to go and visit our cousins. Do you have _any_ idea what they're _like_?"

Harry, of course, knew exactly what the Dursley family had been like in the past, but deigned to make no answer. Kind or unkind, wizard or Muggle, family was family and Harry was not about to deprive his family the chance of knowing them, no matter how they came across.

The truth was, Dudley Dursley and his family were much nicer than Harry's Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia had been. Dudley was the only one in his family who knew what Harry and his family were. He had not seen how it would add any relevance to his family's peaceful life and, at any rate, he had been ordered by the Wizengamot to re-sign the Statute of Secrecy once he had married. The Dursleys and the Potters had remained on Christmas card terms for twenty-five years and the latter family visited about once a month during the holidays, much to the chagrin of the Potter children.

Lily continued her tirade.

"All they do is boast about how they have the 'latest things' and then they look at _us_ like we're freaks when we haven't got a clue what they're going on about! I mean, really, us? Freaks? They're _Muggles_. Look at what they have to do to get by, they are _so_ pathe—"

Lily was silenced by a look from her mother.

"We are all very well aware of your opinion, thank you very much, Lily Potter," said Ginny warningly, "so you would do well to keep it to yourself for once."

"I find their Muggle ways kind of interesting," Albus said, pointedly ignoring the glares from his sister, as though he dared to side with their mother. "Okay, yes, they're prats – Mum, don't give me that look, it's true – but it's really funny about how they go on about how they do things. At first I thought that they were just unobservant, but they really are completely ignorant of magic."

"So was I, until I got my Hogwarts letter," said Harry, "and I'm not Muggleborn, don't forget. Dudley's wife and children don't know any different. The Wizarding society isn't as large as the Muggle one, so it makes sense that the general view in the world is that Wizardry doesn't exi—"

"Alright, I give up, I get your point!" Lily cried, throwing her hands in the air. "Merlin, you talk to Aunt Hermione too much—"

"_LILY!_"

"—sorry, Mum, but you know that Dad _never_ talks like that, it all comes from her!"

Ginny knew that to be true and her mouth curled into a small grin, although she did not allow her children to see it. Her husband, however, did and his green eyes twinkled knowingly behind his glasses. Thankfully, Lily chose to end her rant there and most of the trip to the Dursley home passed uneventfully, with James pointing out the occasional oddities he spied on the Muggle streets.

* * *

><p>"Well, here we are," Harry said, pulling into the driveway of Number 16 Privet Drive. His daughter glowered at him.<p>

"I still don't see why—"

"Lily, stop it!" said her mother. "You're old enough to stop complaining now. Now, everybody, wands, please." She held out her hand. They all passed their wands to her and she tucked them away into her handbag.

"_Yeah, Lily, stop it!_" James mimicked in a high voice. He laughed until he caught the look on his father's face.

"When I get the hang of wandless magic, I'm going to hex every last one of these idiots," Lily muttered, careful so that her parents didn't hear. She received a warning look from her Albus.

"They're not so bad, Petal—"

"_Don't_ call me Petal!"

"—and anyway, you still have about another year and a half until you're of age, I'd hold off from using any kind of magic on them for now."

Lily scowled.

"Well, if we wait any longer, Mum's hair's going to go grey," said James, bored. "Let's get this over and done with."

Getting out of the car, they walked up to the door. Harry only had to knock on the door twice before it swung open.

"Hello, hello," Gloria Dursley said, welcoming them in, "Welcome back! Oh James, you're so tall! – You might be a little taller than Tom, now – Albus, you look more and more like your father every time I lay eyes on you – where's Lily – there you are! – you're so beautiful! How old are you now, sixteen?"

"Fifteen," the red-haired girl muttered.

"Fifteen!" Gloria clasped her hands together. "Oh, I remember being fifteen – James, just put yours coats on that rack, over there – oh, the fun I had at your age, Lily! And how is school, are you doing well?"

Gloria Dursley was a rather pleasant woman, the polar opposite of Harry's Aunt Petunia. A short, plump woman with light brown hair, she reminded the Potter children of a rather fat mouse, and always greeted the family with warmth unmatched by the rest of her family. She constantly coddled her children and Dudley – perhaps that was why he had married her – and took pride in making her home look as elegant as it possibly could. While she knew that her children were not perfect, her only response was to love them, even when they did wrong and she had passed thirty-eight years of her life without uttering a single scolding word to anybody, always striving to make the best out of every situation.

"Fine," Lily said stiffly, pressing her lips into a thin line and fighting the urge to sigh impatiently.

"Lily's in her second last year," added Ginny, jumping in.

"Oh, that must be so exciting!" Gloria said, leading everybody into the living room. "Amy's in her first year of her apprenticeship, she's just started, you see – Dudley, dear! Harry's here! – and I must say, she's been doing splendidly – Tom! Amy! Mark! Your cousins are here, come down! – Tom has started full-time at Grunnings, too – ah, there you are."

Dudley Dursley had walked into the room, followed by his three children. Over the years, Dudley's physical appearance hadn't changed much. He was still quite large, although he had slimmed down a little since the Potters had last visited, his blonde hair had started receding ten years beforehand and his big, bushy moustache reminded Harry strongly of Uncle Vernon.

The Dursley children all varied in appearances. Thomas Dursley, the eldest, was enormous. He seemed to have inherited the Dursley appetite and was rarely seen without some sort of food in his hands or pockets, as if the threat of having a heart attack didn't exist. He was often at his grandparents' house, discussing the workings of Grunnings – which had all but officially turned into the family business – with his Grandfather Dursley. Amy Dursley, the middle child, was the complete opposite to Tom. Tall and thin, with her long, blonde hair always arranged in strange designs – today she had managed to make it look like a roll of hay – she was always suspicious of her Wizarding cousins and their unusual behaviour. Like her paternal grandmother, she prided herself on knowing as much gossip as she possibly could, always claiming to be 'gardening' on days of nice weather, when she was really listening to Mr and Mrs Next-Door argue with their children. She'd been buying tabloid magazines since she'd been able to read – an accomplishment that Lily could hardly believe was possible – and she had yet to throw out a single one. If the Potter children had to pick a favourite out of their Dursley cousins, however – and they rarely would – it would be Mark Dursley who took the prize. He was a silent, pensive sort of boy, rarely speaking to anybody unless directly spoken to and always the first to act with a degree of civility towards his Wizarding relatives. His courtesy, however, seldom went further than a "How do you do?" before he retreated back to his room, choosing to mix with his strange relatives as little as he possibly could.

Today he was not going to be so lucky. He muttered his usual greeting, not really listening to the responses and turned around to leave, before his mother called out to him.

"Mark, where are you going? Not to your room, I hope! No, no, take Albus into the second living room, show him that new game we bought for you the other day – what was it called? – oh, never mind –"

Mark grunted in reply. Albus shot a pleading look at his parents, who returned it with one that reminded him of his Transfiguration professor, and then shot a glare to his sister, who was stifling a smirk unsuccessfully. Seeing that he would receive no rescue from James either, he sullenly allowed himself to be led out of the room.

"Good afternoon, Dudley," said Harry politely.

"Good afternoon," came the stiff reply.

The room once more lapsed into silence, before it was once more broken by Gloria, who always tried her best to allow everyone the opportunity to have a cheery disposition.

"Er, Tom, dear," she said to her eldest son, "will you please fetch the tea things from the kitchen? – And bring out a plate of biscuits, too, please – then you and James may sit and talk in the kitchen – the two of you may share some of the apple pie that you've been enjoying all morning—"

"Yes, mother," said Tom, his cheeks turning a light shade of pink. James suspected that there may not be any apple pie _left_ in the kitchen. Following Tom out of the living room, he saw that there was indeed an empty apple pie tin on the kitchen bench. The eldest Dursley son quickly disposed it and, pulling a new one out of the freezer, said quietly, "I won't tell if you don't."

This left Lily Potter and Amy Dursley. Gloria looked at her daughter expectantly, a smile on her face, but the girl showed no inclination to ask Lily to go anywhere or look at anything. Lily also preferred to remain near her parents, almost worried that she might jinx her cousin if left alone with her – almost, but not quite – and it looked for a moment as though she might be able to sit with them, when Tom re-entered the living room, carrying a silver tea tray. He set it down, a plate of biscuits to the side, prompting Gloria to resume her chatter.

"Thank you, dear – Ginevra, Harry, do sit down, you'll notice that we've recently had the chairs reupholstered – Amy, dear, why don't you—"

"It's not Amy."

"Pardon?"

"My name," said Amy slowly, "It's not Amy. It's 'Tuney. You know, like Grandmother Dursley?" There was something about the arrogant drawl in her cousin's voice that almost made Lily's jaw drop, but she caught the look that flickered between her parents and checked herself, satisfied to know that she wasn't the only one who thought Amy's behaviour a bit odd.

"Oh, er, of course…dear," faltered Gloria, "Why don't you and Lily go up to your room? You can show her the tools you use for your apprenticeship – and your new laptop – we got it for her for placing in a small regional competition – nothing large, you see, but still a great achievement for someone so new to the industry!"

"That sounds lovely, doesn't it, Lily?" Ginny said quickly, giving her daughter a look that told her not to argue. "Go along now."

Scowling, Lily followed Amy out of the living room and up the stairs towards her cousin's bedroom. She happened to look into the second living room and saw Albus chucking quietly at her misfortune. She gave him a rude hand gesture and grimly went on her way.

Gloria Dursley took a seat next to her husband, holding his hand and smiling around at everyone. Ginny smiled politely in return, but both Dudley and Harry still looked rather awkward in each other's company, as if the latter hadn't visited irregularly for the last nineteen years. Gloria served everybody tea and said, "So, has Dudley told you the news?"

Her husband stiffened slightly.

"No, not at all," replied Ginny. "What news do you have? Have you decided to redecorate the kitchen?"

"Oh! No, no we haven't – although I must say, Dudley," Gloria turned thoughtfully to her husband, "that the painting might need to be redone in a couple of months – but no, we have no plans yet to improve our kitchen – no, no, this news is much more exciting!"

The Potters waited in respectful anticipation.

"We're going to have another baby!"

* * *

><p><em>Everything about Amy's room<em>, thought Lily Potter, _screams 'Muggle'._ From the non-moving posters on her walls to the non-moving photographs in their frames to the many shelves of neatly filed magazines, Amy Dursley's room could never cease to amaze. Lily looked up to find that posters of Muggle celebrities had begun to fill her cousin's bedroom ceiling as well. Sitting awkwardly on a chair by a desk, she watched Amy close the bedroom door and open the window instead.

"Mind if I have a fag?"

"Er, no," said Lily, wondering what on earth a fag was.

"I usually have to sneak outside to have one, but you're here—" Amy gestured towards Lily "—so I can't and I don't want to stink out my room." She lit what Lily thought looked like a small, thin Muggle cigar and drew a deep breath from it, exhaling the smoke out the window. The two of them sat in awkward silence, until,

"So, how's that school of yours going?" asked Amy. "What's it called again? Strapham Alexandra's or something?"

"Strathallan Alexanders International," replied Lily, glad that she'd remembered the name of the cover-up Muggle boarding school that she'd made up. "Yes, it's going well, I suppose."

"Boarding school, isn't it? Co-ed? And in Scotland," said Amy, a tone of slight suspicion in her voice. "Why go to a school so far away?"

"It's the best school in Britain," quipped Lily, "and my parents went there."

"Did they really?" Something flashed in Amy's eyes. "Not what I heard…" she muttered.

Lily pursed her lips. She made a mental note to ask her parents what her cousin had meant by that statement. Trying to swing the conversation away from her personal life, she asked Amy about the laptop she'd received from her parents, trying to remember from Muggle Studies exactly what it was that a laptop did. Thankfully, her plan succeeded.

"This," Amy began, a note of arrogant pride in her voice, "is my new laptop. It's the newest Mac Book," she added, as if that added some sort of significance to the foreign object in front of Lily, "and they're currently sold out all throughout Europe. It's got the latest upgrades and I had the cover custom designed." She stroked the top of the laptop with one finger, tracing the lines of what looked like some very ugly yellow splotches. "You don't have a laptop at all, do you?" she sneered.

"No," said Lily, "but Dad got a computer last summer."

"Oh."

They sat in silence for a little longer, Amy finishing her little Muggle cigar before once more picking up conversation.

"I suppose your boarding school must cost a lot. Perhaps your parents can't get you all laptops yet. How much does it cost to go there?"

Lily quickly thought of a number.

"Eighty-five thousand pounds a year."

Amy dropped the little stub that she'd been playing with.

"Must be some freaky school," she muttered. This new information silenced her and she pointedly ignored Lily for the next half hour, tapping the buttons importantly on her laptop. _Make conversation,_ Lily thought, _perhaps you should listen to Albus and Mum for a change. Perhaps Muggles aren't all that strange if you talk to them._

"You have a lot of magazines there," said Lily.

"Oh, yes, yes I do," said Amy proudly. "I've just begun subscribing to magazines from overseas, you know. I have friends – girls who I met in the completion, very well known in the industry, they are – who send me a couple of weekly magazines from Australia and America. Daddy pays them to, of course, but he refuses to buy me any others."

_He bloody well shouldn't buy you any, _thought Lily.

"I've started taking Japanese classes, because then," continued Amy, "they'll have to buy me a subscription to a Japanese magazine and when they see how well I'm doing they'll have to let me subscribe to others."

Lily was almost shocked beyond words at the girl's selfishness. _Almost worse than Verity Creevey_, she thought. "Do you speak Japanese well?" Lily asked politely.

Amy snorted. "I don't speak it at all," she replied. "I rock up to class and that's about it. Imagine trying to learn such a language! It's like someone's decided to go nuts with a biro on a bit of paper. Reckon I'll quit soon, anyways," she added, "and say I graduated early."

Again the two girls fell into silence. Lily was hoping that any moment now her parents would call for her to come down, to leave. Ten minutes passed with no such luck; Lily once again tried to start a conversation.

"So…" she started, "You go by the name 'Tuney', now?"

"Yeah," said Amy. "Like my grandmother. It's short for 'Petunia'. I reckon it's a better name for a hairdresser than Amy is."

"Oh. What made you pick Petunia?"

"It's my middle name," drawled Amy, slowly. "I have to say that Daddy had rather good taste in making it so. Having such an uncommon name these days would make me a social reject, but it makes for a pretty cool middle name. I feel sorry for Tom and Mark, though, bloody awful middle names, they've got. Imagine having Bruce as your middle name! Or Harry! I think I'd demand to change it legally, wouldn't you?"

Lily made no answer.

"Do you even have a middle name?" asked her cousin, arrogantly.

"Luna."

"Bit of an odd middle name."

"It was after my mother's school friend."

"Oh, well. That explains it."

Inwardly seething, Lily restrained the urge to cast a Bat-Bogey Hex at the blonde – the only spell she'd truly mastered wandless – and sat in her chair, refusing to make any more of an effort with her cousin. _The bloody nerve of her!_ she thought. _What, in Merlin's name, does she mean 'that explains it'? That ignorant bitch wouldn't see a house elf if it bit her arse._ Almost giggling at the thought, Lily was finally rescued by the sound of her mother, calling her to come downstairs. Muttering a goodbye to Amy – which wasn't returned – she raced down as quickly as she could.

* * *

><p>"Did you enjoy yourselves today?" Ginny asked in the car, returning everybody's wands to them.<p>

"No," said her three children in unison.

"Having another cousin will be nice, though," said Harry, turning the car onto a motorway.

James snorted.

"Nice to practice what Old Minnie taught in Transfiguration," he said. "It'd be great to see what Tom would look like as a pig…" There was a glint in his eye unseen by his parents, but his father, recalling memories from his eleventh birthday, probably had some idea of what he was thinking.

"Leave them alone, James," he said sternly.

"Surely you wouldn't turn in your own son if his giant fat prig of a cousin just _happened_ to sprout a tail?" There was a hint of mischievousness in James' tone. "Your eldest born? The one who is named after your father and his best friend?"

"Don't count on it," Harry muttered.

"Isn't Gloria a bit old to be having another child?" asked Lily.

"She's still in her thirties," replied Albus, "it's not uncommon for women to have children so late."

"It's still a bit weird. Look at the age gap between this new kid and Mark! It's not going to know it's brothers and sisters, they'll have families of their own by the time it's in school! I wouldn't wish that kind of misfortune on anybody, Muggle or not."

"Can you imagine Dudley and Gloria being…at it, after all this time?" chimed in James, the glint still in his eyes.

"JAMES! _NOT_ THE MENTAL IMAGE I WANTED!" Lily screeched as Albus wretched.

"Guess who's coming over today?" Ginny asked quickly, changing the topic. It was a lot easier than trying to argue with her children. It must have been a lot more effective too, as the three Potter children quickly quietened and sat up a little straighter.

"Teddy?" asked Lily.

"Teddy comes over nearly every day," said Albus.

"Not as much since he married Victoire last year."

"Well being a married man, you can't expect him to. He's in a legal prison now, or so Uncle George always says."

"Married life isn't so bad," murmured Harry quietly, amused, earning him a small appreciative smile from his wife.

"Oh, that doesn't matter," said Lily, waving her hand dismissively, "he's a part of the family now. His prison isn't any different to what it was before. Anyway, is he coming, Mum?"

"Yes, Teddy is coming, Lily," replied Ginny, "but he's not alone. All of your cousins are coming tonight as well! Your father and I thought it would be nice to have everybody over for the night, seeing as you all go back to Hogwarts soon."

The Potter children cheered.

"The Longbottoms and the Scamanders are coming over as well," Ginny continued. "As well as one other person," she added, hesitantly.

"Who?" asked James curiously.

"The Woods?" asked Albus. "They haven't visited in a while."

"It's not the bloody Creeveys, is it?" groaned Lily.

_"LILY!"_

"Verity is a total cow and Colleen follows me _everywhere!_" she moaned.

"Well you're in luck, then," said Harry, "as it's not the Woods or the Creeveys." He pulled into their driveway in the West Country. "It's Scorpius Malfoy." The owls sitting near the kitchen window inside the house were seen to hoot indignantly as Lily's screech seemed to ring throughout the street.

"_WHAT!_"

* * *

><p>When everybody had finished their dinner and the plates had been cleared away by Ginny, Hermione and Hannah, Teddy stood up to address the table, his short turquoise hair changing to a shaggy purple.<p>

"Ahem, ahem," he said in a tone of false importance. "Listen up, please, everybody."

Everybody stopped talking immediately.

"I'd just like to say something small. To my lovely wife, her siblings and cousins, and our esteemed guests – oh, and I guess you too, Malfoy –" he winked at Scorpius, "please join me in the basement as quickly as you can. I've got a brilliant, surprise for all of you – a _Ministry-approved_ surprise," he added quickly, catching the look on Hermione's face. Her face softened. "I'm pretty sure you'll all be quite pleased with me. To Harry and the other adults: you're all welcome to bugger off and stay away from us, no offence intended."

Sitting down, he was instantly inundated with questions. James, Lily, Fred Weasley and Lucy Weasley all begged for him to tell them a bit more about the surprise. Hermione, Percy and Audrey Weasley asked him what was wrong with letting the adults supervise, to which Teddy assured them, perhaps unsuccessfully, that he _was_ an adult. George Weasley huffed in pretend annoyance, desperately wanting to know what it was that _he_ couldn't be allowed to look at. Was he not an honorary youngster?

But Teddy Lupin wasn't a total idiot. The particular item that he had brought home from the Ministry of Magic really _had_ been approved by the Ministry – and Harry had given him a personal OK to let it inside the house! Teddy wasn't entirely sure how to operate the thing that he'd brought back, but he was confident that it couldn't be that difficult – after all, he worked in the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts office! Dealing with these sorts of things was what he had been trained to do and by no other than Arthur Weasley! People often thought of Arthur's fascination with Muggle objects as a bit mad, but Teddy secretly thought that he was brilliant and, in his opinion, the only person who might have a better understand of them was Harry.

Trying to dodge every question as diplomatically as he could, Teddy gathered the Potters, Weasleys, Longbottoms and Scamanders, almost forgetting Scorpius accidentally-on-purpose until Harry gave him a slight nudge with his shoulder. Leading them into the basement, he switched on the light, revealing to them his 'brilliant' surprise.

* * *

><p>A laptop.<p>

Lily had recognised it right away. It looked about the same size as Amy's, but thicker, not quite as lightweight. Everybody broke into whispers, a couple wondering what it was.

"D'you reckon that's one of those things that Muggles use to keep away the nargles?" Lorcan Scamander asked. "I think Mum would like a look at it," he said to Teddy.

"Muggles don't _know_ about nargles, Lorcan," replied Lysander, his twin. "Even most wizards refuse to see them."

Lily rolled her eyes. "That's a laptop," she said, pointing at the wondrous object. "It's like a computer, only Muggles carry it around with them everywhere."

"It looks a bit different to the box we have in the living room," said James, poking it with his finger.

"Well boxes aren't exactly portable, are they?"

"Cool off, you two," Teddy interjected, "Lily's right. A few of us at the Ministry had a couple of raids the other night in Cornwall and we picked this thing up. We've had a little bit of trouble recently with wizards going around and selling Muggle dodgy equipment on this thing they call the 'Impanet'. As far as we could tell, things have been jinxed to be practically useless: books where the ink fades quickly, a perfume called 'Eau du Troll-ette', which you can imagine smells absolutely awful – it's been rather popular, actually – and as far as we've been able to tell, this laptop's been jinxed so that it freezes whenever somebody starts talking. Paige Woodcroft had to pose as a Muggle law enforcer—"

"Get on with it, Teddy."

"—Ah, yes," Teddy said, seeming to realise that he'd begun to waffle. "So, we weren't able to do very much with the laptop after we picked it up and I asked if I was able to have it, to tinker around with it, that sort of thing."

The Weasleys and the Potters grinned to each other. He sounded so much like Grandfather Weasley! To them, Teddy had never seemed to belong more to the family than right now.

"It doesn't appear to be cursed or anything," continued Teddy, "so I've decided to claim it as my own." He appeared to have finished speaking.

"Is that all?" asked Fred. "That's the big surprise?"

"Well, I figured perhaps we could work on it together," Teddy replied. "The things that Muggles come up with these days! I'd really like to see if I could get it working properly, perhaps remove the jinx and see what's on there."

Everybody considered this for a moment and all agreed that it seemed like a fun little project to work on before they went back to Hogwarts in the new year. Crowding around the laptop, they looked at it and prodded it, wary that it might somehow explode.

"How do we turn it on? Is there a switch somewhere?" asked Hugo.

"I can't really see anything, to be honest," replied Lucy.

"Perhaps we should use our wands," suggested Rosemary Longbottom. "Derek Finnegan has been writing to me over the Christmas holidays and has told me about these clever tricks he's picked up from his dad."

James and Louis Weasley shared a look. If Derek was anything like his older brother, Liam, these 'tricks' probably ended in disaster. Dominique Weasley looked as though she might have been thinking something along the same line – Liam had been in her year – and made a movement to stop Rosemary, who had pulled out her wand.

"Rosemary, I'm not sure that's a good idea—"

But the Hufflepuff had already poked the Muggle contraption with her wand, sending off a small shower of yellow sparks and causing the laptop to vibrate. Everyone backed away as the vibrations became increasingly violent. Strange colours and images flashed across the screen and smoke started to appear as a loud whirring seemed to come from within. The laptop shuddered on the desk that it had been placed upon, the whirring getting louder as the smoke began to turn a horrible shade of green.

"What the hell did you do?" shouted Roxanne.

"I—I don't know!" cried Rosemary. "I only meant to turn it on!"

"Somebody try to get it to stop!"

James and Scorpius both drew their wands and cautiously approached the laptop – which had begun to emit sparks as well – and, not paying attention to what the other was doing, both sent a coloured jet of light at it, one red and the other green. The shuddering and whirring, the smoke and the sparks ceased instantly and everybody had just begun to think that the boys had fixed it somehow, when—

_BOOM!_

An explosion from the laptop sent them all flying. The room filled with smoke, sending everyone into coughing fits as they tried to breathe in clear air. It subsided rapidly, and the room stared in wonder at the sight suddenly before them.

_The laptop was working._

Sitting up open on the desk, it was whirring again, gently this time, with a light projecting from an area at the top of the screen onto the blank wall opposite. Taking up almost the entirety of the wall, it showed a single word, surrounded by stars and what appeared to be a lion with a wizard's hat, all in silver. The lion's tail was moving, or appeared to be moving, in a motion that seemed rather unnatural, even for a hand drawn lion. It stopped moving instantly when Lily spoke up.

"What just happened?"

"I have no idea," said Rose, slowly. "It looks like James and Scorpius have somehow started up this thing, but I have no idea what it's doing now."

The room was still silent and once more the lion's tail began to move, as the screen slowly faded to show a notice denying any affiliation with several people.

"It's showing…a musical?" asked Lucy, quickly reading it.

"The jinx must still be in place," said Teddy. "Notice how it only continues to play when we're not talking!"

The room was silent once more and, sure enough, the disclaimer faded again, this time showing something that made everybody gasp. In large, yellow letters, the projection showed what could only be the title of the musical as laughter sounded from what the group automatically assumed to be an audience of some sort. Lily's eyes widened in shock.

"_A VERY POTTER WHAT!_"

* * *

><p><strong>So, what do you think? I've tried to be as painstakingly accurate with everything as I can. If you've noticed any errors or mistakes, please let me know so I can fix them.<strong>

**I like to think that everybody knows who's in the Next Generation, but I understand that it can become confusing, so:  
>Harry James Potter + Ginevra Molly Weasley = James Sirius Potter, Albus Severus "Al" Potter and Lily Luna Potter<br>Remus John Lupin + Nymphadora Tonks = Ted Remus "Teddy" Lupin  
>William Arthur "Bill" Weasley + Fleur Isabelle Delacour = Victoire Weasley, Dominique Weasley and Louis Weasley<br>Percy Ignatius Weasley + Audrey Shepherd = Molly Weasley and Lucy Weasley  
>George Weasley + Angelina Johnson = Fred Weasley and Roxanne Weasley<br>Ronald Bilius "Ron" Weasley + Hermione Jean Granger = Rose "Rosie" Weasley and Hugo Weasley  
>Draco Lucius Malfoy + Astoria Greengrass = Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy<br>Luna Lovegood + Rolf Scamander = Lorcan Scamander and Lysander Scamander  
>Neville Longbottom + Hannah Abbott = Alice Longbottom and Rosemary Longbottom<br>Dudley Dursley + Gloria Marigold White = Thomas Bruce Dursley, Amy Petunia Dursley, Mark Harry Dursley and an unborn fourth child**

**Like it? Love it? Hate it? Just want to leave a smiley face or a single word? Click the review button below! It'll mean the world to me. :)**


	2. Act 1 Part 1

**Author's Note: I never expected that I'd be so lucky to get 10 reviews on the first chapter! I'd like to thank Ginnythesinger (yes, I understood the reference immediately! :D), Somerlia, WobblyJelly, jumbie55, The Musical Fool, Mr Kowalski, monicafoster, Gloria Jean (haha yes, you did inspire two of the characters - namewise, at least - in fact, you also semi-inspired a third :D), Ruji and LizziePixie-Aiko for reviewing! It honestly meant the world to me. Additional thanks to Somerlia, VampBite606, BalletandBooks, The Musical Fool and monicafoster who put this story on alert and/or favourite'd it! You can't imagine my excitement! :D**

**Second Author's Note: **Gloria Jean: **I try to be as meticulous about details as I possibly can, so I'm always reading as much information as I can find on the Next Generation. I did make up some of the characters, because I can't bear the Potters and Weasleys being the only ones with children! So, I created Alice and Rosemary Longbottom, Gloria Dursley and the Dursley children.**

**Final Author's Note: I had a good long think about how I wanted to write out the musical. Do I write it out like a story or write it out like a script? A story would be far too difficult and take away from the overall feel of the musical. I've never written a script before so I wouldn't know how to do that. Thus, I've kind of combined the two (I hope). Things relating directly to the musical are in bold and songs are italicised as well. If you feel like it, try watching the musical while reading the story!**

**Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter. Why do I know that? Because my name's not JK Rowling. Starkid owns A Very Potter Musical, because they're abso-bloody-lutely fantastic.**

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><p><strong>A Rather Unusual Holidays<strong>

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><p><strong>Act 1 Part 1 – Who the Hell is That?<strong>

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><p><em><strong>Previously on "A Rather Unusual Holidays":<strong>_

_The Potters visit the Dursleys. The non-magical kids are prats and Dudley and Gloria are expecting!_

_Teddy Lupin brings a 'Ministry-approved surprise' to the Potter home._

_The 'surprise' happens to be a laptop, which just so happens to go nuts and begin to play a rather unusual video…_

"_A VERY POTTER WHAT!"_

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><p>The room was silent. There was no denying the presence of shock on the faces of all who were present. Then, suddenly, everybody burst out in chatter, shouting at each other as they tried to comprehend what was going on.<p>

"What the hell is this?" asked Lily.

"You don't think it's about your family, do you, Potter?" Alice Longbottom asked James.

"It might be," said James uncertainly, "but the name 'Potter' could mean anything!"

"Oh, yes," Scorpius drawled sarcastically, "there are a _million_ things it could be referring to."

"Shut it, Malfoy," Lily snapped. "Go home."

"I don't exactly have a choice in being here, Red."

"Stop it, you two," Victoire warned, trying to get the two of them to stop arguing. Lily and Scorpius were often at each other's throats – sometimes moreso than how they could be with Lily's brothers – and their arguments could become very nasty very quickly for anybody caught in the firing range. Some might have said that their behaviour hid a secret passion for one another – and indeed the thought had occurred to Victoire – but even though she had watched them carefully for a time, she saw no signs of a secret affection between the two.

The number of questions about what the supposed musical might be about grew.

"Do you think it's really about Lily and her family?" Rosemary asked Alice.

"It looks a bit old to be about us…" Albus interjected, overhearing her. "How old is that thing, anyway, Teddy?"

"It's not that old! It's in very good condition! – Actually, no, it _is_ pretty old – about ten years or so…" admitted his cousin-in-law.

"Well if it's about the Potters then it must be about us Weasleys, too!" Fred spoke up, as proud as always of his family and its connections.

"But if it's ten years old then it couldn't be!" Lucy replied. "We were only toddlers! No, it couldn't about our family."

"Uncle Harry, then?"

"Perhaps…" Dominique jumped in.

The chatter between the teenagers in the room grew progressively louder. Teddy, looking around the room, found his wife talking with Roxanne and Molly about whether or not they might see how their parents met, and taking her gently by the arm, led her to the other side of the room.

"Who would have thought that this would happen?" he asked her quietly. "They seem to have completely forgotten about whatever it is this Muggle contraption is playing."

"Perhaps we should calm them down," she replied. "We can't know for certain that this musical is about Uncle Harry's family, but I think we should ask James, Albus and Lily whether we continue to see where it goes, all the same."

"That's my girl," Teddy said, kissing her on the forehead. "I love you, Victoire."

Victoire blushed, as she always did each and every time her husband said he loved her, and smiled up at him, before turning around to stop the chaos brewing in the room. The two managed to succeed after sending sparks fly from their wands several times, quietening the rowdy group of people.

"Lily, James, Albus," Teddy started, "do you _want_ to watch this? It does look as though it's some sort of Muggle play, which means that it mightn't be about your family at all – but in case it is – do you have any problems with watching it?"

The three Potter children shook their heads.

"Then let's get comfortable!" Louis proposed, moving the couches in the room to face the wall with the projection and charming them so that more of them were able to sit comfortably on them. Lily watched in slight dismay as Lucy transfigured the old rug on the floor into something a bit more plush – it had been a favourite rug of hers! – so that those who did not sit on the couches were able to be a little more comfortable on the floor.

"It's a charm, it won't hold forever," she said, catching the look on Lily's face. The latter breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

Everybody chattered quietly so that the picture playing on the wall would not resume playing and, once they had all settled, stopped talking immediately.

**A boy with insanely curly hair and glasses looked up. Dressed in dark pants and a shirt with a grey jumper pulled over it, he moved his hair from his face, easily showing the lightning bolt on his forehead.**

Lily gaped. "Is that supposed to be _Dad_?" she asked incredulously.

"I—I've got no idea," James stammered. "Who else has a lightning bolt scar on their forehead?"

"That looks a bit similar to our school uniform," Alice remarked. "Is it possible that this is about when he was at Hogwarts?"

"It could be," replied Lily. "But I don't get it! That can't be Dad! This guy looks _nothing _like him!"

"Perhaps if you shut up, Potter, we'll find out," snapped Scorpius from the rightmost seat on the couch. Lily threw a pillow at him and missed, accidently hitting Lysander Scamander, who'd been sitting on the floor in front of him.

"Hey!" he cried.

"Sorry!" Lily whispered apologetically. Becoming silent, she turned to face the wall again, missing the faint blush on Lysander's cheeks. It did not, however, go unnoticed by Scorpius, who 'accidently' hit the Ravenclaw's back with his foot in annoyance, under the pretence of bringing it up so that he could sit cross-legged.

**Wrapping his arms around himself – as if to slightly shield him from the cold – the boy looked around, sad and unhappy. The tune playing in the background became a little more melodic and he began to sing.**

**BOY: **_**Underneath these stairs**_

_**I hear the sneers and feel the glares of**_

_**My cousin, my uncle and my aunt**_

Everybody in the room gaped. None of them had known what to expect when the musical had begun to play, but it did seem as if these people – whoever they were – intended to sing right away. Scorpius, Alice, Rosemary, the Scamander twins and most of the Weasley cousins had not stayed awake long enough in Muggle Studies to know exactly how a musical worked – did this boy intend to sing for the entire duration?

James, Albus and Lily were completely gobsmacked. The boy _seemed_ like their father, from the first few lines that he had sung – but how was that possible? He looked nothing like him – yes, his hair appeared to be jet black, but it wasn't messy! It was simply all over the place – a random mess of curls – _everywhere!_ The scar on the boy's forehead looked rather different and his facial expression! – could it have been any more forlorn? Lily scoffed in disgust, causing the laptop to pause.

"Well, Lily?" asked Rose, gently. "Do you think that's Uncle Harry?"

"It looks like an imposter," Lily said, sneering at the wall-turned-screen. "I don't like it."

"Give it a chance, Petal," said Albus, condescendingly patting her shoulder.

"_What have I said about calling me—"_

"Cool off already!" Scorpius snapped. "If this guy _is_ your father then I, for one, would like to enjoy him making a fool out of you and your family name!"

Victoire, Dominique and Louis all had to hold back their Potter cousins, who'd tried simultaneously to lunge at Scorpius Malfoy's throat.

**BOY: **_**Can't believe how cruel they are**_

_**And it stings my lightning scar**_

"Lightning scar," repeated Alice. "I think we can safely say that this guy is supposed to be your father, Potter," she added, looking at James.

Lily took that opportunity to glare at Scorpius, who was smiling smugly on the other end of the couch.

**BOY: **_**To know that they'll never ever give me what I want**_

_**I know I don't deserve these**_

_**Stupid rules made by the Dursleys**_

_**Here on Privet Drive**_

Albus frowned.

**BOY: **_**Can't take all of these Muggles**_

"It must be a Wizarding play of some sort," said Molly. "Muggles don't know themselves as Muggles – they don't know that Wizards exist, how could they? – so I don't see how this could possibly be a non-Wizarding play."

"But laptops aren't common in the Wizarding world," began Lily, "so why is something like _this_ playing from something like _that?_"

"They're rare, yes," replied Teddy, "but that doesn't mean that they're unheard of."

**BOY: **_**But despite all of my struggles**_

_**I'm still alive**_

_**I'm sick of summer and this waiting around**_

_**Man, it's September and I'm skipping this town**_

_**Hey, it's no mystery, there's nothing here for me now**_

Everybody's hearts began to pick up speed as the song did too – it was rather amusing and – for those in the room who properly knew Harry's story – so far a rather accurate account of him.

**BOY:** _**I gotta get back to Hogwarts**_

_**I gotta get back to school**_

_**I gotta get myself to Hogwarts**_

_**Where everybody knows I'm cool**_

Lily raised an eyebrow. Without a doubt, this boy was supposed to be portraying her father – she knew that from the mention of the Dursleys – but she knew that he didn't think of himself as 'cool'. What was this?

"Sounds a little bit like your attitude, Potter," Scorpius drawled, looking sideways at Lily. "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, does it?"

Lily was ready to hex him when Alice spoke up.

"Wrong Potter, Malfoy," she said. "He sounds a bit more like James."

James grinned.

**HARRY: **_**Back to wizards and witches and magical beasts**_

_**To goblins and ghosts and to magical feasts**_

_**It's all that I love and it's all that I need**_

_**At Hogwarts, Hogwarts, I think I'm going back**_

Everybody smiled as they remembered how fantastic Hogwarts truly was. "I can't wait to get back to school, now," said Hugo.

"Why? Want to take another swipe at Nearly Headless Nick's nearly headless neck?"

"That's your trademark move, Fred, not mine."

**HARRY: **_**I'll see my friends, gonna laugh 'til we cry**_

_**Take my Firebolt, gonna take to the sky**_

_**No way this year anyone's gonna die, and it's gonna be totally awesome**_

"What?" asked Roxanne. "Was I the only one who heard that?"

"No, I think everybody heard it," Lorcan Scamander replied. "'_No way this year anyone's gonna die'_ – now why would that come up as something that he's particularly looking forward to?"

"It's perfectly natural to not want anybody to die," said Lysander.

"Yes, moron, I know that, thank you," Lorcan snapped, "but why bring it up at all? When we started school we didn't particularly hope that nobody would die."

"Honestly, you two," said Rose. "Have neither of you read _Hogwarts: A History, Volume II_?"

"Of course not," said Lily, "why would they? It's not like their mother is in it or anything."

Lysander turned a light shade of pink in embarrassment at Lily's sarcastic remark.

"I'll buy it if it makes you happy," he said, smiling. A dry-retching sound came from behind and he turned around to look at Scorpius, who was glaring at him in apparent disgust.

"Get a room, you two," the blond-haired Slytherin said. "I really wouldn't want you to ruin this special performance of your father for everyone – it's _so_ entertaining," he added sarcastically.

"You're always welcome to leave, Malfoy," Lily replied coolly. "The stairs are just over there." She readjusted her position on the couch, bringing silence back into the room so that the projection would begin again.

**HARRY: **_**I'll cast some spells with a flick of my wand**_

_**Defeat the Dark Arts, yeah, bring it on!**_

_**And do it all with my best friend, Ron**_

_**'Coz together we're totally awesome**_

Everyone watched with baited breath as the door opened and a figure came through.

**RED-HAIRED BOY: **_**Yeah, and it's gonna be totally awesome!**_

Scorpius roared with laughter and everybody else in the room sat in shock, slack-jawed. This guy looked like a moron! And the red hair – it looked so _fake!_

"Easy to see where your Weasley genes come from," Scorpius said, still laughing. He dodged a couple of cushions thrown by Hugo, Fred and Roxanne.

"That's not my dad, Malfoy," Hugo said. "You wait and watch. My dad's not a moron."

"You could fool me, Weasley," snorted Scorpius. Hugo and Rose jumped at Scorpius, their fists aimed straight at his head – and the Malfoy boy might have been beaten to a pulp had Albus and James not held their cousins back.

"Ignore the prat!" James said. "We _know_ that this guy isn't Uncle Ron, Hugo."

"There isn't any physical resemblance between the two," Molly added. Dominique and Louis nodded.

Rose and Hugo seemed to calm down a little at this and they sat back down.

"What I wouldn't give to punch his pretty-boy face sometimes," Hugo muttered, settling into the rug. Teddy gave him a slight nudge with his foot, warning him to be quiet.

**RED-HAIRED BOY: Did somebody say Ron Weasley?**

Hugo half-groaned – of course they would get someone to act out his father as an idiot! Scorpius started to laugh and was promptly elbowed – hard – by Alice.

**The boy identified as Ron walked over to Harry, hugging him briefly before stepping back.**

**RON: What's up, buddy? Hey, sorry it took me so long for me to get here, I had to get some – Floo powder, but, uh, we gotta get going. Come on, get your trunk, let's go!**

Rose sighed inwardly. This person couldn't even completely remember their lines! Fumbling through the bit about Floo powder – using the word 'uh'! – her mother had taught her from a young age that 'um' and 'uh' had no place in a formal speech of any sort. This musical might not exactly be a speech, but Rose was certain that the same rules applied.

**Harry picked up his trunk.**

**HARRY: Where are we going?**

**Ron had a look on his face, as if to say, 'Well isn't that obvious?'**

**RON: To Diagon Alley of course!**

**HARRY: Cool!**

**RON: Come on!**

If anybody sitting in the room hadn't been somewhat appalled by the musical before, they were now. They watched, half-amused, half-horrified at the scene in front of them.

"What the hell are they doing?" asked Fred.

**HARRY & RON: Floo powder power, Floo powder power, Floo powder power, Floo powder power!**

"'_Floo powder power'_?" said Hugo. Scorpius opened his mouth. "Don't bother saying anything, Malfoy, even I'm appalled by that."

"These Muggles are quite curious, aren't they, Lorcan?" Lysander asked his twin. Lorcan frowned.

"Are we entirely sure that they're Muggles?" he asked.

"How could they be?" replied Molly. "They know about Uncle Harry, they know about our world – there are only a select few who know so much – they can't be Muggles."

"Perhaps," said Scorpius, not being rude or sarcastic for the first time the whole evening, "and yet, their movements seem rather inferior, don't you think? They haven't demonstrated any use of magic – what was with all of that arm-flailing and 'Floo powder power' rubbish while they ran about the room?"

"Perhaps they are Muggles and they have Wizarding relatives," Rosemary suggested.

"This is a musical – they probably have several people working on this – how is it possible to have a couple dozen people, _all_ Muggles and _all_ with Wizarding brothers or sisters? The chances of that are phenomenally unlikely."

The room sat in almost-silence, Lorcan humming softly to keep the laptop from playing.

"I think," started Rose slowly, "they really are Wizards. I can think of only one possibility that makes any sense."

"What's that?" asked Victoire.

"Muggle Studies! It must be a Muggle Studies class! The quality of this musical isn't very good – and Teddy said the laptop was quite old – so my thoughts are that perhaps – providing that this is about one of the years that our parents spent at Hogwarts – it could be contemporary to the time it's set in, or perhaps a couple of years later."

Everyone began to nod, realisation dawning in their eyes.

"What's not to say that this is an assignment for Muggle Studies? We've had a couple of really odd Muggle Studies professors in the past – Al, you've paid attention, you know how they've been – so it makes sense that perhaps this is a Muggle Studies class that have been required to put on a Muggle-style play without magic!"

"That would explain a lot," Lucy agreed.

"It does seem to be the most likely situation," Scorpius agreed, slightly disappointed. He privately thought that it would be rather interesting if the whole Muggle world knew about the Wizarding community and – despite their magical prowess – their kind was completely oblivious to the fact.

Everyone settled back down again, happily agreeing that the people performing must indeed be magical.

**RON: **_**It's been so long, but we're going back**_

_**Don't go for work, don't go there for class**_

Rose giggled quietly. That did sound a little like her father.

**HARRY: **_**As long as we're together—**_

**RON: —**_**gonna kick some ass—**_

**HARRY & RON: **_**—and it's gonna be totally awesome!**_

Everybody laughed. So far, despite the fact that whoever wrote it seemed to glorify Harry a little – Scorpius thought that there might not be much glorification at all, from what he'd heard from Blaise Zabini – it was quite amusing and they all began to resign themselves to the idea that the whole thing might not turn out to be so bad.

"What's that little hand movement that they do?" asked Lorcan, forming his hand into a fist with his pinkie finger and thumb sticking out. "Why do they shake it like that?"

"It looks like a Muggle sign language colloquialism of some form," said Dominique. "It's strange – we never learned about such things at Hogwarts."

"No, neither did we," Rose said.

"Well, if it's contemporary to our parents' time," said Roxanne, "then it could have easily been scrapped from the curriculum in the time between their time at Hogwarts and our time at Hogwarts."

"Quite true."

**Standing side-by-side, Harry and Ron continued to sing.**

**HARRY & RON: **_**This year we'll take everybody by storm**_

_**Stay up all night, sneak out of our dorm**_

James grinned. He knew exactly how they would have done that – why, he had the perfect instrument in his trunk upstairs!

**A girl jumped up from behind Harry and Ron – it was now clear that they'd been standing side-by-side to conceal her – and joined in with them.**

**GIRL: **_**But let's not forget that we need to perform well in class**_

_**If we want to pass our OWLs!**_

"What is she going on about, 'owls'?" asked James, shaking his head slightly. "You reckon she means O.W.L.s? Why would anybody shorten the exams like that?"

Lily shrugged. "Muggle colloquialism?" she offered as an explanation.

James grinned, a slight glint in his eye. "Perhaps, they're _actually passing _owls," he said slyly.

Everybody just looked at him.

"As in, they're shitting owls?" he said, the grin on his face more pronounced.

Everybody groaned. Scorpius and Roxanne threw a couple of cushions at him. Lily whacked him across the back of the head. Lorcan and Lysander looked slightly alarmed in his choice of language.

"Hey, that hurt!"

"Well then don't go saying stupid things like that!"

**The three of them lurched forward.**

**RON: Woah! God, Hermione, why do you have to be such a buzzkill?**

"That's Mum!" Rose exclaimed.

"She's quite pretty," said Hugo, leaning forward a little to get a better look at her.

"She doesn't really look like her though, does she?"

"No."

"The hair…"

"Yeah."

**HERMIONE: Because, guys, school's not all about having fun! We need to study hard if we want to be good wizards and witches!**

Rose and Hugo looked at each other.

"Mum," they said in unison.

**Ron groaned as the music began to pick up pace, signalling Hermione's re-entrance into the song.**

**HERMIONE: **_**I may be frumpy—**_

Most of the room snorted despite themselves. Rose frowned and Hugo looked slightly amused. Frumpy wasn't a word to describe their mother – she had far too much class for that – but the fact that _this_ Hermione was so easily admitting it was both worrying and amusing.

**HERMIONE: —**_**but I'm super smart**_

_**Check out my grades, they're As for a start**_

"What's Aunt Hermione going on about?" asked Lily, a look of incredulous wonder on her face. "An A isn't that good! That's the lowest pass grade you can get!"

"Most Muggles use a grading system where an A is the highest pass grade one can achieve," Molly replied. "But even in a Muggle Studies play… They must have thought that using the Muggle grade system would gain them extra marks."

"I wonder if it worked…" Alice said, thinking about whether or not their Muggle Studies professor would have known which system these wizards were referring to.

**HERMIONE: **_**What I lack in looks, well, I make up in heart**_

_**And, well, guys, yeah, that's totally awesome…**_

**Harry and Ron didn't look completely impressed, but they appeared to agree with her and walked to her right with Hermione continuing to her left.**

**HERMIONE: **_**This year I plan to study a lot…**_

**RON: **_**That would be cool if you were actually hot!**_

The room gasped in surprise. Scorpius sniggered.

"Wouldn't have thought that your father would've been into arranged marriages, Weasley," the blonde sneered at Hugo.

"He isn't," Hugo snarled back. "Just because _your_ father married your mother unwillingly doesn't mean that my parents had to marry out of obligation."

"Leave my mother out of this, Weasley," Scorpius growled.

"Oh, guys, shut up!" Lily said, sighing loudly. Everyone looked at her in surprise. Lily Luna Potter, giving up a chance for someone to attempt to murder Scorpius Malfoy? They'd never have thought that they'd witness something so monumental. "Hugo, Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione didn't date from Day One, it's quite possible that he didn't realise how beautiful she is until much later." Her cousin smiled at her.

"Hey, that could give us an approximate year that the musical was set in!" said Louis animatedly. "Rose, Hugo, do you know when your parents started dating?"

Hugo, not having ever given the topic much thought, shook his head, but his sister launched into an answer immediately.

"It was about 1998, I believe – bloody hell, that's a long time ago – but Aunt Ginny told me once that Dad was obviously smitten with her in their sixth year – she thinks that his feelings had begun developing earlier, about their fourth year… Mum has never struck me as a particularly romantic type, but I remember my parents and your parents—"Rose gestured to the Potter children "—talking about something that happened in Mum's sixth year, which I remember thinking to be quite sweet at the time… Can't remember what it was for the life of me, though…"

"Okay, so, this could be set anywhere between, say, their first and sixth year," Louis replied.

"Surely not their first couple of years, though," said Teddy. "They were only kids then."

"Yes," Victoire said, agreeing with Teddy. "Look at Lorcan and Lysander – they're in their first year but they don't have crushes on anybody."

Everybody but Scorpius, funnily enough, failed to see the light pink tinge Lysander's cheeks – but perhaps it was only a reflection of the light.

"If they had a crush, nobody would know, would they?" asked Fred, poking Victoire's knee. "That's – the – whole – point – of – a – crush." He poked her knee with every word.

"Something interesting about your shoelaces?" Scorpius asked loudly, looking at Lysander. Everybody turned to look at the apparently offending boy and Lysander was embarrassed by the attention that was focussed on him.

"I thought I saw an Umgubular Slashkilter skittering about my feet," Lysander lied, desperately trying to keep his cool. "You should probably tell Harry, James," he said, looking at the eldest Potter, "one or two of them are okay, but if they're breeding then they'll become particularly nasty and start eating your house. You won't want an infestation."

"Er – yes, of course," said James, feeling a little awkward. Not feeling that there was anything left to say, everybody quietened down to let the musical play again.

**HARRY: **_**Hey Ron, come on, we're the only friends that she's got!**_

Scorpius thought about saying something, but re-evaluated his decision when he saw just how close Alice's elbow was to the zipper of his pants.

**RON: **_**And that's cool…**_

**HERMIONE: **_**…and that's totally awesome!**_

**HARRY, RON & HERMIONE: **_**Yeah, it's so cool and it's totally awesome!**_

**The music picked up pace as about a dozen others came onto the stage, dancing and maintaining the general beat.**

Molly and Victoire, both incredibly sharp-eyed girls, noticed the inconsistency in the uniform of those on stage, but, looking at each other for a moment, chose to say nothing about it.

**HARRY, RON & HERMIONE: **_**We're sick of summer and this waiting around**_

_**It's like we're sitting in the lost and found**_

_**Don't take no sorcery**_

_**For anyone to see how…**_

_**We gotta get back to Hogwarts**_

_**We gotta get back to school**_

_**We gotta get back to Hogwarts**_

_**Where everything is magi-coooool**_

"Do you think that hand gesture means anything?" Lysander asked, referring to the way in which Ron, Harry and Hermione lifted their slightly curved hands upwards.

"I don't think so," said Albus.

"Then why focus on it?"

"Maybe whoever recorded this had Wrackspurts floating about their head!" Albus' answer sounded a little frustrated at best. Lysander, however, didn't seem to notice his tone and, satisfied with the answer, stopped talking.

**ALL: **_**Back to wizards and witches and magical beasts**_

_**To goblins and ghosts and to magical feasts**_

_**It's all that I love and it's all that I need at**_

_**Hogwarts, Hogwarts**_

**HARRY, RON & HERMIONE: —**_**I think we're going back…**_

**The screen faded to black.**

"What's happened?" asked Rosemary. "Why did it stop? None of us said anything."

"I think it's finished," said Ted, slowly.

"Finished!" exclaimed Lucy. "How could it be finished? We hardly saw anything! Was that really it?"

"Well nothing's happening," replied Fred unhelpfully.

At the moment, the door to the basement opened and the real Harry, Ron and Hermione stuck their heads through the doorway.

"How are you guys going down there?" asked Harry.

"What are you doing?" asked Hermione.

Everybody but Teddy and Victoire looked between themselves in a slight panic. Should they say anything? It didn't matter if their parents had already seen the musical – they probably had, seeing as it was probably performed when they were at school – but if anybody brought it up then the adults upstairs might be tempted to come down and watch. While Scorpius wouldn't throw any more barbs at anybody, it would certainly ruin the atmosphere that had been created. Rosemary, Louis and Hugo all opened their mouths, probably about to offer three very different accounts of what was going on, when Teddy beat them to it.

"Nothing much, really," he said, "putting on a bit of a show and all that. We've had a couple of matches of Wizard's Chess—"

"Oh, Wizard's Chess!" said Ron, his face splitting into a grin. "I love Wizard's Chess! Can I come down there and play a couple of games?"

"NO!" Teddy, James and Molly said quickly. They were, perhaps, a little too quick for Hermione, who frowned.

"Why not?" asked Ron, genuinely confused and slightly hurt.

"Yes," said Harry, a small grin forming on his face, "why not?" If they really were playing Wizard's Chess, he'd eat his robes – and he knew that wouldn't happen because he knew for a fact that there were no Wizard's Chess sets down there at all. Teddy's 'surprise' hadn't looked like one either.

"Because, Dad," said Lily, rolling her eyes and sighing loudly on purpose, as if to indicate that the answer was obvious, "Teddy said that only us kids could be down here – none of you are kids – so shoo."

"Teddy and Victoire aren't kids either!" exclaimed Ron indignantly.

"Dad, that doesn't matter," said Rose. "He's the founder of our elite club, he's allowed to stay."

Ron huffed a little, but then smiled. None of them were getting into any trouble; that much was obvious, so he didn't mind letting them have some 'Parent Free' time – he remembered not liking his parents being around much, either, as much as he loved them.

Harry, Ron and Hermione smiled at them and, ascending the couple of steps that they'd climbed down upon entering, went to leave the room. Lily noticed that James had developed a telltale glint in his eye and, groaning inwardly, tried to mentally prepare herself for whatever stupid thing came out his mouth.

"Oh, Aunt Hermione," said James, calling his aunt's attention in a sing-song voice. Hermione stopped and looked at him, smiling.

"Yes?"

"You're very beautiful," her mischievous nephew said, "and it doesn't matter what Uncle Ron has ever said, you've never looked frumpy in the pictures I've seen of you at Hogwarts."

Hermione's eyes snapped to Ron's, who looked alarmed and began to splutter, "Wha—Bu—I didn't say anything like that – I've never said anything like that, 'Mione! – Never!"

"And," continued James, not finished, "I just wanted to let you know that we all know that you had friends at Hogwarts, despite anything that my dad may have said in the past." He turned away, grinning wickedly as Hermione rounded on Harry, who also looked quite flustered.

"Upstairs, now," she said to her husband and her best friend, her lips pressed thinly together.

The basement was silent as everyone watched Harry and Ron trudge up the stairs, looking rather confused, with Hermione right behind them. They strained their ears to hear something from the floor above, the door to the basement having been closed by Hermione when she left.

_"You think I'm frumpy!"_

Everybody roared with laughter at the faint sound of Hermione from upstairs. Clutching their sides, none of them noticed as they laughed that the laptop had been loading the next part of the musical in the pauses of silence that had occupied the room. It wasn't until they had all managed to stop laughing a couple of minutes later that they heard a '_plunk_' come from the laptop and, surprised, watched as the next part of the musical was once again projected onto the wall.

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><p><strong>Thoughts? Feedback? Constructive criticism? Please click 'review', even if just to leave a :) or a :( - or even a D: !<strong>

**You may notice a couple of errors throughout this story with my transcribing the musical. This is because at times the audience laughs a bit too loudly and I can't clearly hear what's being said so I try to lip-read as best I can and do a little guesswork. I went to the StarKid site for the lyrics as it saves a lot of time but if you've bought the CD you may notice differences - this is because the characters are watching the musical, not listening to the CD, so obviously I'm going to change it around a little if the actors somehow mess up the words or something.**

**Recapping info about the Next Generation (with a little extra thrown in):**

**Remus + Tonks = Teddy (Gryffindor)  
>Bill + Fleur = Victoire, Dominique and Louis (all Ravenclaw)<br>Percy + Audrey = Molly (Ravenclaw) and Lucy (Gryffindor)  
>George + Angelina = Fred (Gryffindor) and Roxanne (Ravenclaw)<br>Ron + Hermione = Rose and Hugo (both Gryffindor)  
>Harry + Ginny = James, Albus and Lily (all Gryffindor)<br>Draco + Astoria = Scorpius (Slytherin - duh)  
>Neville + Hannah = Alice (Gryffindor) and Rosemary (Hufflepuff)<br>Luna + Rolf = Lorcan and Lysander (both Ravenclaw)  
>Dudley + Gloria = Thomas, Amy, Mark and a fourth (all non-magical prats who won't be appearing again)<strong>

**And until next time!**


	3. Act 1 Part 2

**A/N: I'd like to thank monicafoster, Nightlover2, jumbie55, The Musical Fool, WishfulTrance (x2), LizziePixie-Aiko, Vitzy and Wizards-Pupil for reviewing! Y'all have no idea how much it has meant to me. Also, thank you to Nightlover2, PhoenixShadow101, WishfulTrance, Vitzy and Spastic-Kitty for alerting me and/or my story; and to Nightlover2, Vitzy, LizziePixie-Aiko, fanofanime2006 (I forgot you the first time - sorry!), WishfulTrance and wiskerface for favouriting me and/or my story. It's a massive boost of confidence whenever I get one of those notification emails, it really is.**

**A/N: Also, last week I got into Pottermore! I was super excited. I was sorted into Ravenclaw, which was really weird because I've been a dedicated Hufflepuff for almost a year - needless to say it caused a kind of identity crisis! I still go to answer "Hufflepuff" as my house when I do Facebook Harry Potter quizzes. It feels so wrong to put Ravenclaw and yet that is where I am! Perhaps I'll just put down Pigfarts next time - keep it neutral.**

**And speaking of Pigfarts...**

**Disclaimer: If I was J.K. Rowling, I'd probably say so. Actually, no, I wouldn't, but I wouldn't be writing this story, now would I? :) I'm also not a StarKid (just a Starship Ranger) so I don't own AVPM.**

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><p><strong>A Rather Unusual Holidays<strong>

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><p><strong>Act 1 Part 2 – Did Someone Say 'Draco Malfoy'?<strong>

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><p><em><strong>Previously on "A Rather Unusual Holidays":<strong>_

_The Next Generation have decided that this Muggle-style musical must have been performed at Hogwarts while their parents were at school._

_Harry doesn't look like Harry, Ron looks like an idiot and Hermione… well…_

"_You think I'm frumpy!"_

* * *

><p>"Well, Lucy, Rosemary," began Hugo, "it looks like you've gotten your wish. This Muggle-style musical mustn't be over at all!"<p>

"I do hope that there's more than just _singing_ all the time," Lucy replied. "I mean, I am enjoying it, but if all they're going to do is sing then it's going to get boring."

"Yes, I agree," said Fred.

"Perhaps we should quieten down," said Victoire, "and give it shot. Who knows – it could be great! And Lucy, Fred – despite the singing it was rather good, wasn't it? Seeing Uncle Harry, Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione up there?"

"They weren't 'up there'," said Lily, somewhat scornfully, "because that isn't actually them."

"Shut up, Lily," said James. "Let us watch it."

Scowling at her eldest brother, Lily wriggled into the couch and the laptop recommenced playing the musical once all were silent.

**The music grew steadily louder as Harry, Ron and Hermione walked quickly to their left. A female voice quickly called out for Ron.**

**GIRL: Ron!**

**Ron looked behind him and groaned, pushing out his hands to stop a girl with long red hair from getting too close to him.**

**RON: Oh no, no, no…**

**GIRL: You're supposed to take me to Madame Malkin's and use those sickles Mum gave you for my robes today!**

The room was stunned.

"Is that _Mum?"_ asked Albus.

"Her hair wasn't ever _that_ long in the photos I've seen," said James.

"How many red-headed girls do you know went to school with your father, Potter?" Scorpius drawled. Lily glared at him. It was bad enough that the git was here, why did he insist on speaking? For a blissful few minutes, Lily had forgotten that he'd been here, in her house, at all.

"Oh, shut up, Malfoy," Alice groaned. "I've bloody well had enough of you already."

Scorpius scowled and turned back to the wall.

**Ron put his hands up in surrender – clearly this girl wasn't going anywhere.**

**HARRY: Uh, who's this?**

**Harry pointed at the girl.**

The room leaned forward slightly. It was true that Ginny Potter had been the first female Weasley born for several generations, but that didn't mean that this girl was necessarily her – did it?

**RON: Uh, this is stupid little dumb sister, Ginny—**

"That _is_ Mum!" James shouted. "She looks nothing like her!"

"That's not very nice, Potter," Alice said coolly. Having somehow ended up being the only person in her family with hair that was definitely more red than brown, Alice had always looked up to Ginny and her fiery tresses – not to mention that her idol's first words to her had been the incantation for the Bat-Bogey Hex, something that the eldest Longbottom daughter had always found quite useful.

"I'm not saying that she isn't _pretty_," James said, almost spluttering. "I just said that she doesn't look like her!"

"I think it's romantic," said Rosemary dreamily. Everybody in the room looked at her.

"_How?_" asked Scorpius, an eyebrow raised.

"We get to see how Harry and Ginny met," Rosemary replied.

"But we know how they met," said Lily. "They met properly just before Dad started his second year."

"That gives us the year that this is set in, doesn't it?" said Louis, for he had been trying to figure it out for about ten or so minutes.

"1992?" asked Dominique, snorting. "I don't think so. They look considerably older than 12."

"That doesn't mean anything."

"Yes, it does. Nobody's going to take them seriously if they're supposed to be 12."

"_We_ didn't exactly take the first part seriously, did we?"

Dominique opened her mouth in retaliation once more, but, finding no suitable argument, had to settle for, "Shut up."

**The girl, quite clearly Ginny, waved at Harry and Hermione with a large grin on her face.**

**RON: —she's a Freshman—**

"What the hell is a 'fresh men'?" Roxanne asked, pronouncing the American term as she heard it.

Everybody shook their heads, not knowing.

**RON: —Ginny, this is Harry.**

**Ginny and Harry shook hands.**

**RON: Harry Potter. It's Harry Potter.**

**Ginny suddenly looked as though she wasn't able to stop shaking Harry's hand. Her eyes were wide in surprise.**

**GINNY: Oh! You're Harry Potter! You're the Boy Who Lived!**

Lily chucked at the girl's face. She'd heard childhood stories of her mother's infatuation with her father from her uncles – many, many times – and if this musical was true to anything, it seemed to be to Ginny's reaction.

**HARRY: Yeah, you're Ginny.**

**GINNY: Oh! It's Ginevra.**

**HARRY: Cool. Ginny's fine.**

Most laughed at this Harry's apparent disinterest in Ginny's whole name and Scorpius took this opportunity to open his big mouth.

"Looks like your father never really took to your mother," he said loudly to Lily. "Are you still sure that their marriage wasn't arranged? I _have_ read _Hogwarts: A History, Volume II_ so I know about their many 'adventures' – seems to me as though they only got together because everybody expected them to."

Once more the three Potters leapt at the only Malfoy child. Victoire and Dominique managed once more to succeed in holding the eldest two back, but Louis was only able to grab at Lily's shirt, which quickly slipped from his grasp as she landed on Scorpius. In a second her wand was at his throat.

"Take it back," she said in a voice of deathly quiet. Scorpius, however, seemed to have a death wish.

"No," he said simply, never taking his eyes off her.

Lily pressed the tip of her wand into his neck a little.

"Take – it – back," she said again.

Everybody in the room seemed to be split down the middle as to what Lily should do. Victoire, Dominique, Louis, Teddy, Lucy, Roxanne, the Scamander twins and Rosemary were shouting at her to leave him alone, that he wasn't worth it. Her brothers, Fred, Rose, Hugo, Alice and – surprisingly – Molly were all telling her to give him a piece of her mind. Lily and Scorpius kept their gaze on each other the whole time.

"He's just a git, get off him and ignore the idiot!"

"Hex his balls off, Petal!"

"Yeah, show the git!"

"Don't listen to them, Lily, it'll only get you into trouble!"

"Remember that he's supposed to be a guest!"

"If he's a bloody guest then he shouldn't be saying things like that!"

"Well?" Lily asked Scorpius, still pinning him to where he was sitting. Everybody looked at him. His jaw clenched and, quickly moving so that her wand pointed away from his throat, he grunted and pushed Lily off the couch. His trademark family scowl was plastered all over his face.

"I thought so," Lily said, getting up and resuming her place on the couch from earlier. Scorpius didn't say a word. Everybody else quietened down and – not saying anything, lest they too fall victim to Lily's legendary temper – turned back to the wall.

**RON: Stupid sister!**

**He smacked his hands together in the air near Ginny's ear, making her cry out.**

**RON: Don't crowd the famous friend!**

**Harry and Ron put an arm around each other's shoulder. Suddenly, the music changed, taking on a more decidedly Asian note.**

**HERMIONE: Do you guys hear music or something?**

Rose and Molly had been the only ones to register the initial change in tune, but after Hermione had spoken, heads tilted and perked up as everybody else realised that the music was indeed different.

**HARRY: Music? What are you talking about?**

**Harry and Ron removed their arms from each other, as Ron appeared to realise that Hermione was right.**

**RON: Yeah, someone's coming.**

"Oh, typical," said Roxanne, "use the music to announce that somebody else is about to appear."

"That's supposed to happen, I think," said Teddy.

**Everybody looked to their right.**

**RON: Someone's coming.**

**Suddenly, a look of shock and surprise took over the faces of Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny as they saw who had arrived on the stage. Ron, who looked the most shocked of all, pulled his younger sister back by her arm as she pointed at them in obvious surprise.**

**Three girls of varying height had come onto the stage in a straight line. The shortest girl, an Asian who looked to be in Ravenclaw, took the front spot, with another girl – one of average height, also in Ravenclaw – behind her, followed up by one who was rather tall. This girl, too, looked as though she was possibly in Ravenclaw.**

**THREE GIRLS: **_**Cho Chang!**_

_**Domo arigato!**_

**Ron and Harry looked slightly… enthused to see the girls' dance movements.**

Teddy idly wondered if this was the Cho Chang who he'd hired to work in his department several months ago. He remembered the older woman, who'd claimed in her interview that she'd wanted a change from her former workplace, particularly as her relatives had also worked alongside her and they'd never been completely supportive of her marrying a Muggle.

**THREE GIRLS: **_**Cho Chang! You're okay.**_

_**From Cho Chang: Happy, happy new year.**_

_**Cho Chang!**_

**Ending the short song with a small slap to the rear – which seemed to impress Ron and Harry – they turned away, talking to each other in a small huddle. Ginny gave a slight moan of envy.**

**GINNY: Who's that?**

**HARRY: That's Cho Chang.**

**RON: That's the girl Harry's totally been in love with since Freshman year.**

The room filled with gasps and open jaws at this new revelation. Harry Potter? In love with someone who _wasn't_ Ginny Weasley? Impossible, it couldn't happen, to be sure!

Scorpius longed to make a remark about illegitimate Potters running around the countryside, but the sense of gentility that his father had instilled in him suddenly kicked in, alongside a desire to be able to have sons and daughters of his own in the future – a desire that he was sure was dependent on Lily not killing him – and he refrained from opening his mouth.

"Dad and I need to have a little chat," said James. "I don't know what a 'fresh men year' is, but I think I'd like to know a little more about his infatuation with this Cho Chang."

"He's never mentioned having any other girlfriend besides Mum before," Albus said.

"You don't know that they ever dated," said Lucy.

"Oh, that's right."

**Harry flexed his fingers, twisting his neck as though to crack it in a show of masculinity.**

**HERMIONE: Yeah, but he won't say anything to her.**

**RON: Well, yeah, you never tell a girl you like her, it makes you look like an idiot.**

"That," said James, "has got to be one of the wisest things I've ever heard."

Scorpius privately agreed with him.

"That's a bit rich, coming from you. Anyway, I think it's ridiculous," replied Alice. "If you like a girl, I think you should man up and tell her."

"And face rejection?"

"Meh," there was a dismissive wave of the hand from Alice, "there's that and there's also the possibility that you could be happy for the rest of your life."

"Oh, Alice, you're such a romantic," said Rosemary, half-joking.

"Uh, _no_," her sister replied.

**Harry nodded in agreement with Ron at Hermione. Ginny, who'd been looking at the group of girls with increasing interest, walked over to shortest girl and, tapping her on the shoulder, spoke to her.**

**GINNY: Um, konnichiwa, Cho Chang.**

**The other two girls found this incredibly funny. Looking at each other, they giggled as they put their foreheads together, before turning to look at Ginny and their friend.**

**GINNY: It is good to meet you. I am Ginny Weasley.**

"Well, my mother is polite at least," said Lily, a smile on her face.

Rose, Alice and Lysander nodded in agreement. Scorpius thought that Lysander nodded perhaps a little too eagerly.

**Ginny held out her hand to the Asian, who turned around and chuckled to her friends, before snapping at the youngest member of the Weasley family.**

**SMALLEST GIRL: Bitch, I ain't Cho Chang!**

Several people snorted in surprise.

"What do you mean, that's not Cho Chang?" Fred asked loudly. "She's Asian – that girl's Asian – who the hell is Cho Chang if she's not Asian?"

"The real Cho Chang _is_ Asian!" replied Teddy. "She works in my department at the Ministry!"

"I think it's quite funny," said Molly. "It must be a comedic gag – make the Asian witch appear to be Cho Chang so as to throw everybody off!"

"I wonder who she really is?" asked Roxanne.

"She'll probably say when we stop talking," replied Lysander.

At this, the chatter in the room began to decline slowly before stopping altogether.

**Ron pulled Ginny back roughly by her arm, spinning her around to face him.**

**RON: That's Lavender Brown!**

The whole room burst into laughter.

"That's – not – Lavender – Brown!" Hugo said between fits of laughter.

"I know, she looks nothing like her!" Rose said, clutching her sides as she rolled around on the carpet.

Lavender Brown had been the Divination professor for the last five years, taking over from Professor Trelawney after the latter had died suddenly. While she made no grand spectacle of having Second Sight, she tended to be a little overenthusiastic whenever somebody claimed to see something – nearly always made up – and was often seen consulting the ghost of the former Divination professor about lesson plans at meal times. Divination had never been a popular subject amongst the Weasleys or the Potters, with only Dominique completing it as one of her N.E.W.T.s.

**Ron smacked the air near Ginny's ear, making her cry out again.**

**RON: **_**Racist**_** sister!**

"Muggles do care an awful lot about race, don't they?" asked Lucy. "It's hardly necessary to bring it up in any environment other than Muggle Studies."

"I don't understand it – colour doesn't change someone's abilities to do anything," said Rose. "It seems like such an insignificant little thing – and yet they continued to ask the importance of race in Muggle society on every Muggle Studies exam we took."

**The tallest girl walked over to Ginny, patting her back and trying to comfort her.**

**GIRL: Hey, it's alright!**

"What's alright?" asked James.

Lily smacked his head with a cushion.

**GIRL: I'm Cho Chang, y'all.**

**Cho Chang flicked her hair behind her shoulder, a smile on her face.**

The mens' mouths were hanging open – even Scorpius', in a rare, unguarded moment – as Cho Chang revealed her identity. Teddy's arm was smacked by Victoire.

"I wasn't looking at her!" Teddy said. "I swear!"

Victoire wasn't convinced.

"Like I believe that," she said.

"I wasn't! I was merely noting how different she looks compared to the Ms Chang who works in my office."

"Noting her entire body?"

"I—I!" Teddy was spluttering, badly. "I—I wouldn't l-look at her like that! Come on, Victoire!"

"Calm her down, Teddy, it's your own fault," said James. "You shouldn't be looking at a lady in such a way!"

Alice's foot came into contact with James' head.

"That's really rich, coming from you," she said. "You were gawking at her more than every other guy here!"

"Aha," started James, pointing his finger in the air, "but _I_ am not married."

"Yes, and you'll never get a serious girlfriend, either," replied Alice scathingly.

"I already have one."

Everybody raised their eyebrows.

"Rightio. Has she said yes yet?"

"No."

"Exactly – she probably knows that you'd make her miserable."

"Excuse me! If she actually gave me a shot, she wouldn't be miserable at all."

"Because you know _so_ much about making a girl happy."

"Go out with me, Longbottom," James said. "Go out with me, and see."

The whole room sat in almost-silence, the only sound coming from Lucy as she – quite quickly – began to hum softly so that the play wouldn't start again. Nobody was really that shocked about the fact that James had asked Alice out – he, much in the same style as his paternal grandfather, had been doing so since Alice had started at Hogwarts – even getting up on the Gryffindor table at breakfast one morning to do so, giving poor Neville a heart attack and earning him a week in detention.

"Go to hell, Potter."

It was the end of the conversation.

**HARRY: She is totally perfect.**

Albus and Lily raised their eyebrows.

**RON: Yeah, too bad she's dating Cedric Diggory though, huh?**

_Leave it to Uncle Ron to point out the painfully obvious,_ thought Fred.

**HARRY: What? Who the hell is Cedric Diggory? What is that? Who is that?**

"'What is that?'" repeated Roxanne. "Really smooth."

She had spoken up in the hope that it might break the awkward tension that had settled in the room.

**A good-looking boy – evidently Cedric Diggory – walked up to the front of the stage from behind Harry, pushing in between Ron and Harry, thus knocking them, as well as Ginny and Hermione, to the floor.**

**CEDRIC: **_**Cho Chang!**_

_**I am so in love with Cho Chang!**_

**He twirled Cho Chang into his arms.**

**CEDRIC: **_**From Bangkok to Ding Dang!**_

_**I sing my love aloud**_

_**For Cho Chang!**_

**Cedric and Cho ran off the stage together, leaving Harry with a mixed look of sadness and disgust on his face.**

"Wow, he's so cute," Rosemary said dreamily. "Much better than his portrait in the Memorial Gallery."

"A good singer, too," added Roxanne, her face adopting a similar expression.

Fred's mouth dropped as Lily, Molly and Rose nodded in agreement.

"That's completely hypocritical!" he shouted while pointing at them. "How come we get berated for looking at a pretty girl, but then this guy – a Hufflepuff! Look at his tie! – pushes everyone out of the way to just _announce_ his presence and it's okay for you lot to ogle him?"

"We're female," said Lily, light-heartedly. "We're simply allowed to!"

"You were all practically drooling! He's not even that good-looking!"

"Don't speak ill of the dead, Fred."

"I'm not speaking ill of him – just you lot," Fred replied, a grin on his face. Lily smacked his arm good-naturedly.

**HARRY: I hate that guy! I hate him.**

"Woo!" cheered James. "Go Dad!"

"I agree," Scorpius said. "If that girl decided to date a Hufflepuff—"

"Hey! I'm a Hufflepuff!"

"My apologies, Longbottom," Scorpius said, "but like I was saying – if she decided to date a Hufflepuff, she can't be very smart – but at any rate – he'll realise that soon enough. Clearly Mrs Potter is a much better match for him."

James, Albus and Lily looked at Scorpius, the first two calculatingly and the third suspiciously. The eldest Potter edged over to Scorpius.

"Malfoy, a word when this is over?" asked James quietly.

Scorpius nodded.

**RON: So are we gonna get these robes or not?**

**GINNY: Okay, alright, I'm going!**

**RON: **_**God**_**, sister!**

"Was your dad always like this with mum, do you know?" James asked Rose.

"I don't know," replied Rose. "I don't think so. He probably complained about her – we all do about our brothers and sisters, to some extent – but I've no idea if it was anything like up there." She gestured to the musical.

**Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny left the stage through a door, passing another boy walking in the opposite direction. Clearly a Gryffindor, he walked across the stage with hands in his pockets and his head down, until he bumped into two other boys, one of them incredibly tall and the other wearing a cap. He gasped.**

**TALL BOY: Present your arm, nerd.**

"What's a 'nerd'?" asked Lysander.

"It's a derogatory term that Muggles use for a person who is believed to be inferior to the person using it," said Rose. She sounded so much like Hermione that it almost scared her cousins. "Ironically, it is usually a person's intellectual superiority, or markers of it such as glasses or reading, that causes them to be branded such a term."

"And how," said Hugo, "do you know that?"

"Because _I_ always listened in Professor Harris' Muggle Studies classes."

**The Gryffindor boy held out his arm nervously, pulling up his sleeve.**

**GRYFFINDOR BOY: W-w-w-what will you—**

**TALL BOY: Indian Burn Hex!**

**The Gryffindor cried out in pain.**

Louis snorted.

"Way to make up a spell," he said. "What, do they really think that they'll get extra marks for making something up?"

"What the hell's an 'Indian burn' anyway?" asked Fred.

Nobody had any idea.

**Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny walked towards the two boys and the Gryffindor.**

**RON: Ohh, Crabbe and Goyle.**

**Ginny bent down to check on the boy on the floor.**

**GINNY: Hey, are you okay?**

**HARRY: Hey, why don't you leave Neville Longbottom alone, huh?**

Alice and Rosemary spluttered.

"That's _our_ Dad?" the eldest asked, not quite believing what she'd heard.

"N-No, it can't be!" cried Rosemary. "That's _the_ most un-Dad-like person I've ever seen!"

It was true that this boy looked nothing like how Neville had in his youth.

"It's not so bad," said Rose, patting Alice on the knee. "Look at what I've got for a father!"

"Yeah, but at least that guy has red hair," Alice said. "I don't mean to be rude, but what kind of idiot did they hire to portray my father?"

"Calm down," said Teddy. "It's not as bad as all that. I'm sure there are others who match their characters less than the young man on the screen matches his."

"I doubt it," the eldest Longbottom replied bitterly.

James moved over to her on the rug, stopping in front of her legs. Putting a hand on her knee, he smiled and said, "I don't think that this guy's all that bad. None of these wizards and witches looks like our parents. I wouldn't worry about it."

Alice smiled, having apparently forgotten about their earlier argument, and squeezed the hand that was still on her knee.

"Thanks, James," she said softly.

James insides swelled like a balloon. That was the first time she'd called him James directly! And she'd squeezed his hand! She'd _actually_ touched him! He took his hand off her knee and turned away to face the wall, bringing his knees up so that he could wrap his arms around them. He tried hard to suppress the grin that was trying to stretch across his face, but was caught by Lily, who gave him a small, encouraging smile and a wink.

**TALL BOY: Well, well, well, if it isn't Harry Potter. You think all because you're famous, you can boss everyone around.**

**HARRY: No, I just don't think it's cool for guys your size to pick on guys like Neville! Come on!**

**TALL BOY: Oh, well, you know what I think?**

"Do we particularly care?" asked Roxanne loudly.

**TALL BOY: I think glasses are for nerds!**

**The tall boy reached over, took the glasses of Harry's face and made a show of breaking them, roaring in the process.**

Several people in the room cried out.

"What did he do that for?" shouted James.

"What a git!" cried Dominique.

"Who is he?" yelled Fred. "Let's find out so that we can hex him!"

Teddy tried to remain calm, even though the offensive action had been against his favourite person. "There's no need for that," he said slowly. "Harry can take care of himself, you know."

"Then how come it's usually Mum he goes to when he's broken his glasses?" asked Hugo.

"Their departments are right next to each other! And nobody can mend thing quite like your mother."

"Well we know one thing, at least," Scorpius spoke up. Everybody turned to look at him. "They're Slytherins, _obviously._"

Lily glared at him.

"Oh, yeah," she began, sarcastically, "that_ really_ helps us narrow the potential list of suspects down, Malfoy. Congratulations."

Scorpius fell silent. He'd been slightly offended by Lily's remark – cutting, once again – although he couldn't exactly say why – perhaps it was because he'd been trying to patch things up. He'd always been rather awkward when it came to such things – he had seldom been in any position to be the one to make amends – and thus inexperience made it difficult for him to do. Rosemary Longbottom was the only one who seemed to realise that he may have been hurt by Lily's offhand retort.

"I think it's very helpful," she said to the Slytherin, who looked stunned at her kindness. "Thank you. Besides, guys," she added loudly, catching the attention of the room. "We already know who they are, sort of."

"How?" asked Roxanne.

"They were earlier announced as Crabbe and Goyle."

"That's right!" Victoire exclaimed.

"But wait," said Albus, "which one's Crabbe and which one's Goyle?"

The noise in the room grew louder.

"Didn't Crabbe die in the Second Wizarding War?"

"Yeah! – But that still doesn't tell us which one's which!"

"Which witch is which?"

"Nobody needs your pointless questions, Lysander."

"QUIET!" Dominique yelled to cut through the sound. All conversation instantly ceased.

**TALL BOY: We hate nerds!**

**BOY WITH A CAP: And girls!**

"Oh, that is so sexist!" said Rose. "Typical Slytherin behaviour!"

"Hey, you guys," started Alice, "are we _sure_ that this one – this one wearing a cap – is a boy? Call me a Crumple-Horned Snorcack, but I'm not 100% sure that that's the body of a boy…"

"No, I saw it too," said Louis.

"Saw what?" asked Teddy.

"Well," Molly began, "the boy wearing the cap seems to have a chest, doesn't he?"

Those who hadn't noticed it peered forward at the wall, trying to ascertain whether they thought they saw a chest too.

**Harry looked at the broken glasses in his hands.**

**HARRY: Oh! My glasses!**

**RON: Oh, well you asked for it! You don't mess with Harry Potter. He beat the Dark Lord when he was a baby.**

**Despite Ron's strong words, his trembled slightly and he stood directly behind Hermione, seemingly unwilling to offer any help other than that. Hermione put her hands up, ready to solve the situation.**

**HERMIONE: Alright, everyone just calm down. **_**Occulus reparo!**_

**Harry's glasses were mended and they flew back onto his face.**

**HARRY: Woah, cool!**

"You see?" said Teddy to Hugo, winking, "Your mum is the best person I can think of when it comes to repairing anything broken.

**Hermione nodded at Harry, patting his back slightly before hooking her arm through his.**

**HERMIONE: Now let's leave these big baby childish jerks alone!**

**Ron and Ginny nodded as Hermione pulled Harry away from Crabbe and Goyle by his elbow.**

**VOICE: Did someone say Draco Malfoy?**

**Someone – a very short someone – with blonde hair and Slytherin robes walked onto the stage and stopped in the centre, their arms held up with their palms facing upwards. It was clear that this person was supposed to be Draco Malfoy, but was that—?**

"Is that a _girl?_" James spluttered in shock, as the room roared with laughter.

Scorpius was shocked. His mouth hung open, a look of horror on his pale white face.

"_That's your Dad, Malfoy!" _Lily howled, tears of laughter running down her face. "That's _your_ Dad!"

"Shut up!" Scorpius snarled. "That's not my Dad!"

"I think you'll find that it is!" laughed Fred. "And I think you'll find that that person up there—" he pointed to the screen "—is a girl!"

"Is there something your father might want to tell you, Malfoy?" asked James, sniggering.

Rose and Louis were rolling on the floor, clutching their sides. Dominique and Victoire were trying in vain to conceal their giggles. Only Teddy wasn't openly laughing, but Scorpius could still see the humour in his eyes.

The Malfoy child scowled. How dare they make fun of his father! They didn't _know_ that this – this _girl_ (he had to admit that, whoever this person was trying to be, they were a girl biologically) – was his father! They didn't know anything at all!

_Who am I kidding?_ Scorpius thought. Momentarily defeated, he slumped in the sofa, waiting for the room to quit their laughter.

Needless to say, he had to wait a while.

**HARRY: What do you want, Draco?**

_Oh, great_, Scorpius thought, groaning internally. This definitely was supposed to be his father.

**Malfoy turned to the two boys standing to his right.**

**MALFOY: Crabbe, Goyle, be a pair of pals and pay for my robes, will you?**

**Crabbe and Goyle nodded and left. Malfoy rounded on Harry and his friends.**

**MALFOY: So, Potter! Back for another year at Hogwarts, are you? Maybe this year you'll wise up and hang out with a higher calibre of wizard.**

**Malfoy circled the group and then spun around with a flourish to face them. It was obvious that, by 'higher calibre of wizard', he meant himself.**

"He's offering to be Uncle Harry's friend?" asked Lucy, looking sideways at Scorpius. Lily snapped her head to him, her eyes watching but choosing not to say anything. This didn't go unnoticed by the Ravenclaws in the room.

**Harry put his arms around Ron and Hermione.**

**HARRY: Hey listen, Malfoy. Ron and Hermione are my best friends in the whole world. I wouldn't trade them for anything.**

**Ginny, excited, tried to put her arm around Ron, who promptly pushed her off.**

Everybody chuckled at the scene in front of them.

**MALFOY: Have it your way.**

**He looked at Ginny, and pointed at her figure.**

**MALFOY: Wait! Don't tell me! Red hair, hand-me-down clothes and a stupid complexion—**

**The Golden Trio were offended – Ron more than the rest – and the Weasley boy took his arm from around Harry's shoulder.**

**MALFOY: —you must be a Weasley!**

The Weasleys in the room might have glared at Scorpius just then, had they not known that his family no longer upheld such prejudices.

**RON: Oh my God, lay off, Malfoy! She may be a pain in the ass, okay? But she's **_**my**_** pain in the ass.**

"Not really something that Dad would say," Rose said, "and yet, it was quite sweet."

"Yeah, Aunt Ginny might've hexed him later if he'd said that," Hugo chuckled.

**Ginny looked incredibly happy that her brother was standing up for her.**

**MALFOY: Well, isn't this cute. It's like a little loser family.**

**He (or she?) turned to the front.**

**MALFOY: Hogwarts has really gone to the dogs. Luckily next year I'll be transferred to Pigfarts!**

"What the hell is Pigfarts?" asked Fred.

"I've never heard of it," said Victoire.

"No, neither have I," said Rose. "Wait a sec." She stood up and ran up the stairs out of the room.

"Is that a Muggle reference?" asked Rosemary.

"I have no idea!" said Lily. "The name 'Pigfarts' is completely new to me!"

"It sounds like it's supposed to be another school," said Teddy, "but where might it be located?"

At that moment, Rose came hurtling back down the stairs.

"I just asked Mum," she said, panting lightly, "and she's never heard of Pigfarts – neither has Uncle Percy – so I have no idea what to make of it."

"Blimey," said Hugo, "if Mum hasn't heard of it—"

"If _Dad_ hasn't heard of it!" Lucy cut in.

"—then how do we know that it actually exists?"

"I don't know if it does," said Scorpius. "As funny as you all may find this, my father has never once mentioned it."

"Ask him!" said Lorcan.

"Lorcan, that's rude!" Lysander scolded him.

"Like I care," came the reply.

"No, that's perfectly fine," Scorpius said. His lips were thinly pressed together. "He'll be here to pick me up tonight – I'll ask him then."

"Awesome!" said Lorcan, Louis and Fred together.

The room chuckled at the unison.

**Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny moved to the edge of the room.**

**MALFOY: **_**This year you bet, gonna get outta here**_

"Oh, hey, he's actually got a pretty good voice!" said Lily, surprised.

"Surprised, Potter?" asked Scorpius. Traces of a smile could be detected on his face.

"Immensely," Lily replied – but rather than being unkind or sarcastic as she normally was with Scorpius, she sounded truly genuine. This was a first for everybody present.

**MALFOY: **_**The reign of Malfoy is drawing near**_

_**I'll have the greatest wizard career**_

_**It's gonna be totally awesome**_

**Crabbe and Goyle walked up behind Malfoy, moving their heads unattractively to the beat.**

**MALFOY: **_**Look out world for the dawn of the day**_

_**When everyone'll do whatever I say!**_

Several people raised their eyebrows.

**MALFOY: **_**And Potter won't be in my way**_

The Potter children snorted.

**MALFOY: **_**And then I'll be the one who is totally awesome!**_

**He spun around as the tall boy chimed in—**

**TALL BOY: **_**Yeah, you'll be the one who is totally awesome!**_

The room laughed.

"Do you think that's his actual voice?" asked Molly, grinning.

"Nah, it couldn't be," said James, "but his voice must be so hoarse by the end of it."

**The sound of people cheering filled the air – was that supposed to be a train whistle? – as the most of the cast joined the stage.**

**HERMIONE: Guys, come on, we're going to miss the train!**

**Those on stage formed two rough lines and mimicked the movement of train wheels as they sang the next few lines of the song. Malfoy looked wholly unimpressed.**

**ALL: **_**Who knows how fast this year's gonna go?**_

_**Hand me a glass, let the Butterbeer flow**_

**HARRY: Maybe at last, I'll talk to Cho!**

"I don't like this Cho character," said Lily, shaking her head.

"Don't do that," said Teddy, "in reality she's really quite nice – nothing like how we've seen her so far."

"If you say so."

"I do."

**RON: **_**Oh no, that'd be way too awesome!**_

**ALL: **_**Here back to learn everything that we can**_

_**It's great to come back to where we began**_

_**And here we are!**_

**Everybody lurched forward in a movement of showing the train stopping at Hogwarts.**

**ALL: **_**And alakazam!**_

"Alakazam?" asked Albus. "That's one of those Muggle words, isn't it? That's what they think wizards and witches say when they do magic?"

"Correct," said Victoire. "I wonder why that is?"

"I remember in fifth-year Muggle Studies that Professor Harris said that it was used as a word of emphasis after a preceding magical phrase, usually 'abracadabra'. The phrase 'abracadabra' was supposed by Muggles to have magical healing powers, but Professor Binns said in third-year History of Magic that this was a word made up by the wizard Quintus Sammonicus Serenus, a wizard pretending to be a physician in the Muggle Roman Empire in the second century A.D."

"You know, Rose," said Hugo, "when you start rolling out hundreds of facts like that, it just makes you look really scary. Brilliant, but scary."

Rose blushed.

"Ah, but I've heard that Liam Finnegan appreciates qualities like incredible intelligence and passion in a girl," said Rosemary slyly, a slightly mischievous twinkle in her eye.

The Hufflepuff's words had their desired effect. The musical momentarily forgotten, half the room jumped to their feet.

"_LIAM FINNEGAN?" _Hugo shouted.

"_You're joking!_" exclaimed Alice.

"Please tell me you're not dating that guy!" said James incredulously.

"Dad's going to kill you!"

"He's 22, Rose – he's my age!" said Dominique. "Lovely, you're only 17…"

"No, I changed my mind – Dad's going to kill Finnegan!"

"B-but, but I'm not…" stammered Rose, trying to make herself heard over the racket. She glared at Rosemary, who was giggling to herself in a corner – for a usually compliant, happy-go-lucky sort of girl she sure could cause a lot of mischief if she was in the mood!

"I'm going to find him," said Louis in a low, uncharacteristically threatening voice. "I'm going to find him and break any fingers of his that have touched you."

"I can't even begin to think what Grandfather Weasley's going to say about this!" Hugo seemed to have no intention of shutting up.

"He hasn't tried anything funny, has he?" asked Fred.

"Oh you poor, poor thing," said Albus, patting Rose's shoulder.

"Guys…" A tone of slight hysteria was now apparent in Rose's voice.

Teddy and Victoire, who had been sitting back in quiet amusement – they knew that there was no truth to Rosemary's claims, although how they knew was a mystery – decided now to interfere and set their poor cousin's heart at ease.

"Okay, alright, settle down!" they said together, shooting sparks into the air.

"Rosemary, you shouldn't cause poor Rose so much grief!" said Teddy.

"Aw, but it was so much fun, Teddy!" replied the youngest Longbottom girl. "And besides, your mother was in Hufflepuff and she was quite a trouble-maker too – her portrait and I always have quite lengthy chats every Thursday in the Memorial Gallery."

"Don't talk to my mother!"

"Oh, but I like to keep her updated on the workings of our family!"

"WAIT A SECOND," Hugo announced loudly. "Rosemary – were you _joking_ the whole time?"

Rosemary grinned.

"But of course!"

Three people – Hugo, Alice and Louis – launched themselves at her, tickling her in retribution.

"That's what you get for causing so much trouble, little sister!" Alice said evilly, tickling the space behind Rosemary's knees. The younger girl cried with laughter for several minutes until she couldn't breathe – it was only then that they got off her and turned their attention – _Finally_, thought Scorpius – to the musical.

**ALL: **_**Here we go, this is totally awesome!**_

**They rearranged themselves, a few of the cast bringing in long benches to the inner sides of the stage.**

**ALL: **_**Come on and teach us everything you know**_

_**The summer's over and we're itching to go**_

**NEVILLE: I think we're ready for Albus Dumbledore!**

"That's me!" said Albus happily, pointing to his chest.

"No, it isn't, you idiot," said James, shoving him good-naturedly.

"It's my namesake, it might as well be. He's the wisest man in the world."

**The cast lifted their arms in a circular motion, revealing the middle of the two lines as they raised the volume of a musical note. A man in wine-coloured robes, a pointed hat and a small bunch of flowers walked out into the middle of the stage. He had a very, very faking looking beard.**

Albus' mouth dropped.

**DUMBLEDORE: **_**Welcooooooooooome…**_

**The note of the 'o' continued for a while as he threw the flowers into the front rows of the audience.**

"Oh – my – Merlin," said Lily.

Albus was stunned.

"_That_, my friend," said James, patting Albus' back, "is your namesake."

**DUMBLEDORE: …**_**all of you to Hogwarts**_

_**I welcome all of you to school!**_

_**Did you know that here at Hogwarts**_

_**We've got a hidden swimming pool?**_

"Do they really?" asked the Scamander twins, excited. They'd heard about Muggle swimming pools – supposedly it was a favourite spot of Nargles.

"No," said James, shaking his head. "I'd have found it easily if that were true."

"Oh, really?" asked Teddy, looking at him curiously. "How?"

"No reason," James said quickly. Teddy wasn't convinced. He raised an eyebrow at him but said nothing more.

**DUMBLEDORE: **_**Welcome, welcome, welcome Hogwarts**_

_**Welcome hotties, nerds and tools**_

The room chuckled.

**DUMBLEDORE: **_**Now that I've got you here at Hogwarts**_

_**I'd like to go over just a couple of rules**_

**The others on the stage – all evidently students – were now noticeably split into groups. Harry, Ron, Hermione, Neville and Ginny were on the right-hand side of the stage whereas everybody else was on the left.**

**DUMBLEDORE: My name is Albus Dumbledore and I am Headmaster of Hogwarts. You can all call me 'Dumbledore'. I suppose you can also call me Albus if you want a detention.**

Albus smiled to himself. Perhaps he was wrong and this guy wasn't a complete weirdo.

**DUMBLEDORE: I'm just kidding – I'll expel you if you call me Albus!**

The eyebrows of several people shot into their hairlines.

**Dumbledore moved to back of the room.**

**ALL: **_**Back to witches and wizards and magical beasts**_

_**To goblins and ghosts and some magical feasts**_

_**It's all that I love and it's all that I need**_

_**At Hogwarts, Hogwarts**_

_**Back to spells and enchantments**_

_**To Potions and friends**_

_**To Gryffindor!**_

_**Hufflepuff!**_

_**Ravenclaw!**_

_**Slytherin!**_

_**Back to the place where our story begins!**_

_**At Hogwarts, Hogwarts**_

**Dumbledore moved back into the middle of the students.**

**DUMBLEDORE: I'm sorry, what'd you say?**

**ALL: **_**Hogwarts, Hogwarts**_

**DUMBLEDORE: I didn't hear you kids!**

**ALL: **_**Hogwarts, Hogwarts**_

**HARRY: Man, I'm glad I'm back.**

**The screen faded for a second time as the cheers from the audience grew in volume and pitch.**

"Well," said Teddy, speaking after a moment of silence, "that was quite entertaining, wasn't it?"

Most of the people in the room nodded before they all broke off into small groups, discussing what they'd just seen. Scorpius sat still in his place on the couch, hoping that nobody would bring up the embarrassment that was the portrayal of his father. What was all this rubbish about Pigfarts? If it didn't really exist then why bring it up? Where was the humorous link between Draco Malfoy and Pigfarts? Scorpius knew one thing for sure: his father would hear about this.

It was at this moment that James chose to casually stride up to Scorpius, sitting in the empty space next to him (Alice had joined Lucy and Rosemary on the rug).

"So," James said. "Entertaining few minutes."

Scorpius made a noncommittal sound. Why was Potter here again?

"What was with what happened before, Malfoy?"

Ah, that's why.

"I don't know what you mean," Scorpius drawled, scratching his ear.

"You know exactly what I mean," James said. "You stood up for my parents. It was at the expense of others, sure, but you still stood up for them. Why? You've never done it before."

"Dunno."

"Cut the crap, Malfoy."

Scorpius rolled his eyes. "I'm not here because I _want_ to be," he said, almost snapping. "I don't intend to spend the rest of my evening being yelled at by your sister – if I can help it, seeing as she obviously can't – and if saying a few…kind words about your family lets me have a peaceful evening, then that's what I'll do."

If James was surprised by this admittance, he didn't show it.

"So it's got nothing to do with you fancying my sister?"

Scorpius' head snapped to the eldest Potter, his face a look of pure disgust.

"I do _not_ fancy your sister, Potter."

"There's nothing wrong with it."James' tone had become somewhat playful.

"Listen, Potter," the Slytherin's tone was bordering on a snarling whisper, "I most certainly do _not_ fancy her. I don't care for red-heads."

James seemed to study him for a long time, unnerving Scorpius somewhat. After a few minutes, the former seemed satisfied with whatever conclusion he'd come to and, nodding once, got up and left Scorpius to himself.

Scorpius was, unluckily, not alone for very long because moments later the object of his previous conversation marched up to him, her hands on her waist.

"Malfoy," Lily Potter said. "A word?"

He groaned. "Not you too."

"What?"

"Nothing. What is it now?"

Lily sighed. "I guess…" she started. "I guess that I was kind of rude to you before, when you were only trying to be helpful."

"You guess?"

"Okay, okay, I know!" Lily said impatiently. "My point is that while I don't like you – and to be perfectly honest, I don't think I ever will – I shouldn't be rude to you _all_ the time."

Scorpius looked at her for a moment.

"Apology accepted, Potter," he drawled, stretching his arms before placing his hands behind his head, resting on them.

"That wasn't an apology!" flustered Lily angrily. "It was just admittance to wrong-doings!"

"That's an apology."

"It was not!" Lily huffed. "I, Malfoy, will _never_ apologise to you for _anything_! You deserve everything that you get."

She stormed away, fists tightly curled. She would never admit it, but Scorpius had been right – it had been apology – and she'd only done it because Teddy and James had suggested it. That Teddy thought she should apologise was something that Lily could understand – he got along with everybody – but James? It had almost felt like a kick to the gut. James probably wouldn't have noticed Malfoy had it not been for Albus' instant dislike of him in their first year. Their aversion to each other had flared to hatred and back again over the years, eventually settling into a tolerance of each other by their sixth year. Unfortunately, that hadn't stopped Scorpius from picking on Lily when he felt like it – even though she'd hexed him once on Hogwarts grounds.

Joining in a conversation with Teddy, Hugo and Albus, Lily inwardly sighed at her eldest brother's odd request. She didn't often understand James' motives for doing anything – sometimes she felt she didn't understand him at all. Why should he want her to apologise to Malfoy when the git had offended him as well?

"Hey," Lorcan called out. "Can we please get to the next part of the musical? I was really enjoying it."

There were cries and gasps of surprise as everybody remembered the reason that they were in the basement to begin with. All scrambling back to their places – except for Scorpius, who hadn't moved – they sat in eager silence as they waited for the next part of the musical to load.

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><p><strong>And that's it for this week! I don't think I mentioned it earlier, but I plan to update every Thursday (or Wednesday, depending on your time zone).<strong>

**So, what did you all think? James and Alice, eh? *wink wink* Ahaha my brother hates Alice. I have no idea why.**

**Let me know what you think! Did you like it? Hate it? Love it? Do you have any suggestions? Is there anything you'd like to see? Let me know by clicking the "Review" button below - it's one of my best friends here ;).**

**Aaaaand signing out now! I have a new chapter to write. :D**


	4. Act 1 Part 3

**Author's Note: Hi, guys! I am so, so sorry that it has taken me THIS long to get my chapter up. I actually did set out to have it uploaded on time, way back 25 million years ago, and I even skipped classes for a whole day and sat on my butt in the library for 10 hours writing it out. Unfortunately, about halfway through the chapter I hit an obstacle: Quirrell. I had no idea how I wanted the characters to react to the musical at that point and I ended up re-writing most of the chapter about four or five times. Then real life hit me in the solar plexus and I had zero time for anything fun. :( I'm not completely happy with this chapter (I know there are a couple of errors, please forgive me! I couldn't find them when I went back to fix them!) but I figured that something was better than nothing, so I endeavoured really hard to finish the chapter over the last week (university is finished! Yay!) and voila! It is done.**

**I just checked out my stats for the story and all I can say is WOW. I can't believe some of the hits that I'm getting. Most of my readers (or, at least, people who click the link to this story) seem to be Americans, Australians, Brits and Canadians - and y'all are awesome. But then I see that I'm getting some seriously cool places that I never expected to see: places like Puerto Rico, Bahrain and Kenya. I LOVE KENYA! Whether or not you live in America, in Kenya, Ireland or Portugal, don't be afraid to say hi! Any feedback is good feedback - even the negative stuff.**

**And speaking of feedback, I'd like to personally thank all of those who reviewed, alerted and favourited me/ARUH. I usually respond to all reviews, however lately, with all the work I've been doing I haven't been able to, so I apologise!**

**Thank you to: The Musical Fool, Vitzy, monicafoster, Gloria Jean, Rauja, LizziePixie-Aiko, Minx The Shadow Thief, WobblyJelly (x2) (I'm getting back to you as soon as I upload this!), jumbie55, Popcorn Life (x2), HorcruxesandHallows (yay!) and R.E. Nightt for reviewing my story - you guys are the ones who encourage me to keep writing! Thank you to: Draco's Favourite Witch, Skye Love, translucent steeds, Minx The Shadow Thief, jellybeancow, IndigoandViolet, Popcorn Life, HorcruxesandHallows, FutureRockstarBrisa, Dreamer-.-LYNX, R.E. Nightt, ., SexySiri and crazygirl913 for putting my story on alert, it means so much to me! Thanks again to: Popcorn Life, HorcruxesandHallows and crazygirl913 for putting me on alert - you guys are sweethearts :). Thanks to: AmandatheBookworm, Skylar of Hufflepuff, GKingofFez, Skye Love, ariana-tan, Popcorn Life, HorcruxesandHallows, Dreamer-.-LYNX, bookworm299, . and crazygirl913 for listing my story amongst their favourites - it touches my heart :). And lastly, but not least, thank you to jellybeancow, Popcorn Life, HorcruxesandHallows and crazygirl913 for listing me amongst their favourite authors - you've all really put a smile on my face.**

**And, without further ado, I give you my next chapter!**

* * *

><p><strong>A Rather Unusual Holidays<strong>

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><p><strong>Act 1 Part 3 – What the Hell is a Hufflepuff?<strong>

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><p><em><strong>Previously on "A Rather Unusual Holidays":<strong>_

_Scorpius was being a prick. In the end, though, the joke's on him – Draco Malfoy is a GIRL!_

_The Next Generation have decided that the musical probably took place in 1992 – why, that was eons ago!_

_Oh, and James asked Alice out – again, apparently._

* * *

><p><strong>The students, having completed their musical number, cheered and broke up, going to either side of the stage. Ron ran off towards the back.<strong>

Albus couldn't wait. Of course he'd heard the stories of both of his namesakes – dozens of times! – but experiencing it in a whole new way just made it all the more exciting.

**DUMBLEDORE: Guys, guys, guys – welcome to another magical year at Hogwarts! – And a very special welcome to my favourite student, Mr. Harry Potter.**

**Ron returned, with some kind of snack in his hands, and cheered at the mention of Harry's name.**

"One question," Roxanne interrupted.

"Go for it," said Teddy.

"This is supposed to have been done by students, right? So, I'm pretty sure that this guy playing Dumbledore is older than a student. Do you think that they have teachers in on it too?"

"Oh… I don't think any of us thought of that," said Dominique. "Do you think it could still be a student assignment if there are teachers in it?"

"Perhaps they needed more people in it?" said Lysander.

"No, I agree with Dominique," said Rose, "I'm not sure if it could still be an assignment if there are teachers in it – after all, if they needed more people, there are more than enough Hogwarts students to ask."

"So what is it, then?" asked James.

"I don't know – a performance for the school?"

"But that doesn't make much sense," Lysander replied. "Why would someone do something like that?"

"Maybe…" started Louis, thinking hard, "Maybe this _didn't _take place when Uncle Harry was at Hogwarts…"

"What do you mean?" asked Hugo.

"I'm not quite sure… I can't quite put my finger on it…"

"I think you're over-thinking it a little bit, Louis," said Lily. "Just because it has teachers in it doesn't mean that it wasn't done during Dad's time. It could've just been like a play put on for the end of year feast or something."

"Without magic?"

"Dad always said that Dumbledore was a little bit mad," said Lucy.

"Hey! That's my namesake you're talking about!" Albus cried, half-joking. Everybody in the room rolled their eyes. Bloody Albus and his bloody namesakes.

"Oh, whatever," Lucy replied.

**DUMBLEDORE: He beat Voldemort when he was just a baby. You see, he's even got that lightning scar on his forehead to prove it.**

**Ron cheered again at the sound of his best friend's name. Dumbledore walked closer to the benches that Harry and his friends were sitting at, focussing his attention on Ginny.**

**DUMBLEDORE: And another very special welcome to our newest addition to Gryffindor, Mr. Ginny – excuse me—**

The room laughed at the mispronunciation.

"How did he confuse her for a guy?" Lily giggled.

"Nobody's perfect, he probably just messed up the line," Molly chuckled.

"Dumbledore is perfect!"

"_Shut up, Albus!_"

**DUMBLEDORE: —Mrs. Ginny Weasley—**

Everybody laughed again.

"He got it wrong again!"

**Ron booed his sister but it was half-hearted – his attention was focussed more on the food in front of him.**

**Ginny stood up, not looking entirely pleased.**

**GINNY: Yeah, I'm a girl, and also, um, aren't we supposed to be sorted by the Sorting Hat?**

Everybody in the room sat up a little straighter, realising that this was true – nobody had seen anything of the Sorting Hat.

"Oh, so – she _wasn't_ sorted by the Sorting Hat?" Scorpius asked, speaking for the first time in a while. His question went largely ignored.

"Dad never saw Mum being sorted," said James thoughtfully.

"Nah, they were too busy flying cars into trees to notice what was going on around them," Fred replied, grinning. That story had been a favourite of his from his childhood – it had also awakened an almost unhealthy fascination with the Whomping Willow, as Fred had then spent several of his Hogwarts years using his wand to make various objects fly into the enchanted tree to see how it reacted. His experiments had probably earned him as many detentions as his pranks – and he'd lost Gryffindor seventy points after one particularly unfortunate incident involving the Whomping Willow, a newly sorted Slytherin first-year and a bowtruckle.

**Dumbledore turned away, walking towards the middle of the stage.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Well, um, a funny thing happened to the Sorting Hat.**

There were a few curious looks around the room.

**DUMBLEDORE: He actually got hitched with another piece of magical enchanted clothing—**

Lily, Alice, Fred and Lorcan all snorted in surprise and the rest of the room gaped.

"He did _what_?" exclaimed Roxanne.

"There are _other_ pieces of enchanted clothing?" asked Alice.

"I find that to be very interesting!" Rosemary said, rubbing her chin thoughtfully.

"How can a hat get _married_!" asked Lysander.

"Did this actually happen?" Louis asked Rose.

"No!" she replied, as shocked as the rest of them. "I think we would all _know_ if the Sorting Hat happened to do something so ridiculously unbelievable as get married."

"Any chance we could get some quiet so we can find out what's going?" asked Molly, a wide smile on her face. "It's probably not the whole story, you lot. For all we know, the Sorting Hat got married, was attacked in a corridor the next day and is being patched up in the Hospital Wing."

Everybody thought that to be incredibly unlikely but they sat back towards the wall once more.

**DUMBLEDORE: —so he and the Scarf of Sexual Preference—**

Everybody in the room spluttered at this. 'The Scarf of Sexual Preference'? What the hell was that?

Fred's splutter soon turned into laughter.

"The Scarf of Sexual Preference – that's great!" he laughed, almost rolling around on the floor. "Oh – that is _good!_ – classic!"

"There is _no way_ that there was a Scarf of Sexual Preference and nobody recorded it in the history books," said Rose. "This musical's purpose becomes continually less defined, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, I can't think of any Muggle references that would aid their grades," Albus said slowly. What was the point of this play if it weren't for assessment purposes?

"Maybe if we try to figure out what year it was set in, we can figure out why it's being performed," replied Roxanne, her Ravenclaw brain beginning to go into overdrive.

"I thought we agreed that it was set in 1992," said Louis.

"I suppose we'll see where it goes. It's already mentioned Pigfarts – don't forget your promise, Malfoy, or my brother might get a little carried away when he pranks you – and the Scarf, which we know don't actually exist, so it might not be set in 1992 at all."

Louis seemed content with Roxanne's reply.

**DUMBLEDORE: —aren't going to be back until next year.**

**Harry clapped his hands in congratulations as Ginny sat back down, accepting, if not slightly confused by, Dumbledore's explanation. Ron nodded his head in approval, not completely taking his attention away from his food.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Basically I've just been putting anybody who looks like a good guy in Gryffindor—**

Most of the room cheered.

**DUMBLEDORE: —anybody who looks like a bad guy into Slytherin—**

Scorpius scowled. He wasn't a bad guy! Slytherin, for the most part, no longer held Pureblood ideologies anymore! He tried very hard to ignore the smirk growing on Lily's face. Gryffindors, on the other hand, didn't appear to have changed one bit.

**DUMBLEDORE: —and the other two can just go wherever the hell they want, I don't really care.**

**Dumbledore half-shrugged his shoulders as he finished his sentence.**

Albus was very surprised at the Albus in front of him. Everybody he'd ever spoken to – with the exception of an old, former _Daily Prophet_ report and Great Aunt Muriel (who never seemed to die, in the sometimes-harsh opinion of the Potter children) – had nothing but brilliant things to say about his namesake. About how wise, how knowledgeable Albus Dumbledore had been. How thoughtful he'd been, how he'd had a particular twinkle in his eye. How great a judge of character he was. How caring he'd been. Sure, _this_ Dumbledore appeared to be a good judge of character, especially if he was able to sort the students himself, but the fact that he'd openly said that he didn't really care about Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff struck a nerve with Albus Potter.

This wasn't really how his namesake had behaved in real life.

Was it?

"Interesting namesake you have there, brother," James said to him, amused, as if he'd read Albus' thoughts.

"Shut it."

**Cedric Diggory suddenly stood up, his characteristically wide grin on his face.**

**CEDRIC: Hufflepuffs are particularly good finders!**

"YES!" Rosemary cheered.

**Dumbledore looked as if Cedric had suddenly turned into a badger.**

**DUMBLEDORE: What the **_**hell**_** is a Hufflepuff?**

"HEY!" Rosemary cried indignantly. "_I_ AM A HUFFLEPUFF!"

"He's right, you know, Little Rosie-Puff," said Fred teasingly, using the nickname for her that he knew she hated. "What exactly _is_ a Hufflepuff? What does that mean?"

"It's the name of my Founder!"

"Ahh, yes, a Finder! Well, looks like Old Diggory was right, Hufflepuffs _are_ particularly good finders – but that still means nothing to us. Gryffindors are brave, Ravenclaws are smart, Slytherins are gits – what the hell is a Hufflepuff, Little Rosie-Puff?"

The entire room – Scorpius included, despite the crack made at his house – were very amused to watch the banter flying between Rosemary and Fred.

"_Don't call me Little Rosie-Puff!_"

"But what else can I call you? You're a Hufflepuff – and nobody knows what a Hufflepuff really is, do they? – So what else can I call you?"

"I am going to kill you."

"Uh-uh," Fred said mockingly, waving his finger. There was no way that he was taking anything seriously right now. He really enjoyed stirring people up sometimes – especially when they were baited easily, like Rosemary or Lorcan. "I'm a whole lot older than you, Little Rosie-Puff. I've finished Hogwarts and you're just an ickle firstie!"

"I am _not_ an 'ickle firstie', Fred Weasley, I'm in my fourth year now!"

Fred gave an embellished cry of joy and enveloped poor Rosemary in a bear hug.

"Fourth year, already?" He gave an exaggerated sniff, as though holding back tears. "Oh, Little Rosie-Puff, you grow up so fast!"

"_Alice!_"

"Sorry, little sister," the eldest Longbottom daughter grinned evilly. "My loyalties are still with Rose after the little trick you pulled on her!"

"_Teddy!_"

Teddy laughed. "Alright, Fred, let her go – I don't think she can breathe anymore," he chuckled. Fred obliged.

"Little Rosie-Puff growing up so quickly," he said in a babyish voice, prompting a scowl from the Hufflepuff.

"You're not funny," she growled.

"I certainly am!"

"Freddie – seriously – you have to stop now," Victoire said, successfully hiding her chuckles.

"Fine."

**Cedric paused awkwardly, his smile still in place, before sitting down. A dark-skinned girl, who'd been nodding emphatically alongside him, also looked slightly awkward, although her large smile never faltered. Dumbledore blinked as though in disbelief.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Anyway, it's time now for me to introduce my very good friend and our own Potions professor, Mr. Severus Snape.**

**The students clapped.**

"That's my other namesake!" Albus announced excitedly. "Severus Snape – he's my other namesake!"

"We _know_, Albus," said Dominique.

**RON: Oh man, not Snape – I hoped they'd fired that guy.**

**Ron was evidently sulking, his mouth half-full with food.**

**GINNY: Why, what's wrong with Professor Snape?**

"I bet _nothing_ is wrong with Professor Snape, is there, Albus?" James asked, semi-sarcastically.

"He's my namesake," Albus said, very sure of himself. "There couldn't be."

Wasn't that about to be blown out the window!

**Ron looked incredulous at Ginny's question.**

**RON: Oh, nothing, he's – uh – **_**evil**_**.**

Albus' smile faltered slightly. He wasn't naïve – he knew that Severus Snape had been far from a perfect person – but that didn't stop him from looking up to him, if only a little. Surely he couldn't have been that bad if his father had seen fit to partly name Albus after him.

**A man dressed in a set of black robes and cape walked slowly to the front of the stage. His face was pulled in a weird expression and he looked almost wary of all who were present.**

"Is that Snape?" asked James.

"Black hair, black robes, a face that looks like he got hit by a bludger – I'd say so," said Fred.

"Once again, little brother," James said to Albus, smirking, "your namesake."

**HARRY: Come on, Ron, he's really not that bad. I don't know what you're talking about.**

Albus shot James a smirk of his own.

**SNAPE: Harry Potter…**

Everybody laughed at Snape's voice. They'd heard that Snape had spoken in a low drawl, but this was…certainly something else.

**SNAPE: **_**Detention**_**.**

**Harry stood up.**

**HARRY: What!**

**SNAPE: For talking out of turn.**

"_What!_" Lily cried. "He gave him a detention over _nothing_?"

"Dad always said that Snape was a big, greasy git," Hugo replied, shaking his head a little.

"Yeah, so did mine," agreed Roxanne.

"Hey! That's my—"

"You and your bloody namesakes, Albus, I swear!" shouted Dominique, throwing a cushion at him. It bounced off his head with a satisfying _whump_. Her cousin merely scowled back at her.

**Harry sat back down, disgusted.**

**SNAPE: Now before we begin, I'm going to give you all your very, very first pop quiz.**

**Everybody groaned except for Hermione, who gave out a happy little "Yes!" She was clearly quite excited.**

Rose and Hugo exchanged knowing looks.

**SNAPE: Can anyone tell me what a Portkey is?**

**Hermione's hand immediately shot into the air, her fingers wiggling in anticipation.**

**SNAPE: Oh, yes, Miss Granger.**

**Hermione immediately launched into explanation, not stopping to take a breath.**

**HERMIONE: A Portkey is an enchanted object that when touched will transport the one or ones who touch it to anywhere in the globe decided upon by the enchanter.**

Rose eagerly leaned forward, a massive smile on her face. She obviously knew what a Portkey was – she'd finished Hogwarts last year, how could she not know? – but the chance to see her mother in a learning environment, even if it was within the context of a musical, was something she'd always wanted to see.

Snapping out of her reverie, she looked quickly around the room, feeling several pairs of eyes on her.

"What?" Rose said, wondering why everybody was staring at her.

"You realise that she sounded exactly like you, didn't you, Rose?" Hugo said in a stunned voice.

"Don't be ridiculous."

"It's true," Fred said, inching away from her slowly. "Don't come too close to me – your brains might suck all the fun out of me!"

"Now _you're_ being ridiculous," Rose said. "She doesn't really sound like me at all."

"Can I remind you of when you – just ten minutes ago or so – rambled on about Quintonius Salamander Serena-whatshisname and the origins of the word 'abracadoodle'?" asked Roxanne. "I'm sorry to say it, sweetheart, but you didn't stop to take a breath! Neither did the Aunt Hermione in this musical!"

"Neither does Aunt Hermione in real life!" James joined in.

"Firstly, Roxanne, his name was Quintus Sammonicus Serenus and the word was 'abracadabra'," Rose huffed, "and secondly, James, nobody asked you."

"That means we're right," James murmured to Dominique, elbowing her slightly. She nodded in agreement.

**SNAPE: Very good. Now can anyone tell me what foreshadowing is?**

Everybody in the room laughed. Clearly, he was introducing a plot device.

**Once more, Hermione's hand shot up as Snape looked about the stage for people to answer the question. Hermione's hand shaking as eagerly as before, Snape had no choice but to choose her.**

**SNAPE: Yes, Miss Granger.**

**HERMIONE: Foreshadowing is a dramatic device in which an important plot-point is mentioned early in the story to return later in a more significant way.**

Everybody gave Rose a pointed look.

"Alright, alright!" she said, exasperated.

**Snape looked a little impressed.**

**SNAPE: Perfect.**

**Ron lifted his head from his food, his mouth half full.**

**RON: Uh, what's a Portkey again? I missed that one.**

**HARRY: Yeah, I missed that one.**

**Hermione, of course, immediately jumped to their 'rescue'.**

**HERMIONE: Oh, a Portkey is something that when you touch it, it can transport you anywhere.**

**SNAPE: And remember a Portkey can be any sort of simply harmless object like a football or a dolphin.**

"What's a football?" Fred asked curiously.

"It's a Muggle sport," said Albus**, "**where players run around a field and kick a large round black-and-white ball, which is about the size of a Quaffle."

"I thought that was called soccer?" asked Lysander.

"No, it's called football."

Everybody began to launch into their own explanation as to what they thought a football actually was. It very quickly escalated into an argument about Muggle artefacts.

"I thought a football was orange…"

"No, that's a blender – I've seen one of them, they're used by Muggles to cook food."

"No, they're not, that's a vac—a vick—a big eclectic thing with a hose attached to it to clean away food scraps."

"No it's not, they have microwives for that!"

"Professor Harris said that was a skettle!"

"Professor Harris is a Pureblood, what does she know about Muggles?"

The Potter children huddled with Rose and Hugo, the five of them giggling madly at the suggestions being put forward. Having Harry as a father, the Potters obviously knew about most of the Muggle appliances and sports, even if they weren't entirely sure how to operate some of the more complex ones. With Hermione as their mother, Rose and Hugo had no chance of being ignorant of the 'outside' world, so to speak.

Albus and Rose had taken quite an interest in Muggles when they were young, at first thinking that they were ignorant people with incredibly bad vision – after all, who _couldn't_ see the Knight Bus as it sped down the London highway? – but they'd had to give up this theory once they'd begun taking Muggle Studies in third year. Muggles were just plain, dull, non-magical people who had a system of complexly difficult networks in place in order to keep their life as easy as possible. That was that.

"Emmeline Thomas told me that—"

"Alright, enough talk about Muggles already!" Lily said, growing tired of the volume of noise. Curiosity had gotten the better of her and she was by now very interested in what the musical held.

It took Teddy and James several goes of shooting sparks into the air before the room was finally enveloped in silence.

**LAVENDER: Professor!**

**SNAPE: Yes…**

**LAVENDER: Can, like, a person be a Portkey?**

"That's the most ludicrous thing I think I've heard all night," said Louis.

"Exactly!" exclaimed Molly. "'Can a person be a Portkey…' Honestly, it's a wonder that this Lavender is in Ravenclaw."

**SNAPE: No, that's absuuuurd.**

The room chucked at the elongated 'u' in Snape's speech.

**SNAPE: Because if that person were to ever **_**touch themselves—**_

**He looked pointedly at Ron, who had a look of shock on his face that demonstrated that he'd no idea why Snape was picking on him. Ginny laughed behind him.**

Despite his mental resolve to stay quiet for the rest of the night, Scorpius burst out laughing.

"Oh, come on," he said when the Weasleys and Potter glared at him, "that was funny! – _Don't_ throw that cushion, Potter, I wasn't making fun of your uncle – _I swear._"

Fred looked at him for a long time, before shrugging and saying, "Ah, well, he's probably right."

"_Fred!_"

"Oh, shut up, Lily, he wasn't making fun of Uncle Ron – not Snape either, Albus, you don't have to worry about your precious namesake – and it _was_ pretty funny."

**SNAPE: —they would be constantly transported into different places. A person can, however, be a Horcrux.**

**HARRY: What's a, what's a Horcrux?**

**SNAPE: I'm not even going to tell you that, Harry, you'll find out soon enough.**

Everybody in the room glanced around nervously at each other. Horcruxes… That wasn't a particular topic that bode well in the Wizarding world. Harry didn't have much of a problem talking about the time he, Ron and Hermione went hunting for Horcruxes – it had, in fact, made up a large part of his children's favourite bedtime stories – but that didn't make it a laughing matter.

**Harry looked as though he was wondering what Snape could possibly mean by what he'd said.**

**HERMIONE: Professor, what's the point of this quiz?**

**SNAPE: Oh, no, no, no point in particular, just important information that everyone should know…**

"That a person can be a Horcrux but there's no need to mention what that is?" asked Lorcan sceptically.

**SNAPE: Especially **_**you**_**.**

**He pointed towards the audience.**

"Ah," said Teddy, "a very obvious plot device."

"Indeed, indeed," James said in a tone of mock importance. "Ladies, gents – you too, I guess, Malfoy – pay attention because Portkeys and Horcruxes are obviously important to this important tale."

"But Dad never used a Portkey until the summer before his fourth year – he told me so when I asked him a couple of years ago," Albus said.

"So then this play must have been performed in 1994!" exclaimed Louis, who'd been looking for indicators by which he could date the musical.

"What makes you say that?" asked Victoire.

"So far, what we've seen is accurate as to what happened in Uncle Harry's life. The wizard playing Professor Snape pretty much gave away that Portkeys would be an important plot point in the storyline. If the musical wasn't performed in 1994, then it must at least have been _set_ in 1994."

"Touche. And yet… your argument, Louis, has one flaw."

"What's that?"

"Aunt Ginny. She was sorted in 1992, remember? This Dumbledore made note to say that she was a new addition to Gryffindor. Also, Uncle Harry didn't know what a Portkey was – which, if he first used one in his fourth year, as Albus said, makes it possible that in his second year he found out what a Portkey does."

Louis was a little surprised that his logic had failed but didn't argue with Victoire.

**SNAPE: Now, moving along, there are four houses in all. Gryffindor…**

"YEAH!" yelled James.

**Ron cheered loudly.**

**SNAPE: Ravenclaw…**

**A few whoops sounded from Cho Chang.**

"10 points to Ravenclaw!" yelled Roxanne.

"You're not at Hogwarts anymore, Roxanne," said Fred, grinning. "Besides, if I remember rightly, you weren't so pleased when you were sorted into Ravenclaw, were you?"

"I was fine, thank you!"

"I remember it as thought it were yesterday… You were openly sobbing at the Ravenclaw table during breakfast a couple of days later…"

"Well if I'd known that Dad was _joking_ when he told me to not bother coming home, I would've been fine!"

Everybody in the room sniggered.

**SNAPE: Hufflepuff—**

**CEDRIC: Find!**

**SNAPE: What?**

**Snape stopped and shook his head, as if clearing the confusion out of it.**

Everybody giggled.

**SNAPE: And Slytherin…**

**Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle gave a little cheer of their own.**

**SNAPE: Now traditionally—traditionally, points are given for good behaviour and deducted for rule-breaking. Example: ten points from Gryffindor!**

**HARRY: What!**

**SNAPE: For Miss Granger's excessive baby fat.**

About a dozen pairs of eyebrows shot into their respective hairlines.

"Did Mum ever have baby fat when she was young?" Rose asked Hugo.

"How am I going to know? I wasn't exactly around when she was Lorcan and Lysander's age," her brother replied, scoffing slightly.

"I meant in the photographs, you idiot."

"Ohhh!" Hugo finally understood and nodded his head. "Yeah, no, I've got no idea."

Rose rolled her eyes, muttering something that sounded a lot like "Useless!"

"I can't believe that Snape took away points for something like that!" Fred exclaimed, rather surprised. "He's being a bit of a git."

He looked over at Albus, as if challenging his cousin to say something about his beloved namesake, but the younger Potter boy just looked uncomfortable and turned away.

**Harry and Ron looked annoyed, as though they shouldn't have expected anything else.**

**HARRY & RON: Thanks, Hermione.**

"They're blaming _Aunt Hermione?_" Lily asked, shocked. "_Why?_"

Nobody could answer her. Lysander hummed a basic little tune to keep the musical from playing, noticing that everybody – apart from Scorpius – seemed to be trying to figure out the answer to Lily's question.

"The only thing that I can think of is that it's for entertainment," said Alice after some time. She stretched her arms in the air, cracking her back.

"I don't find it that funny," Rose replied.

"Maybe not, because it's your mum – but think about it – if they were total strangers, don't you think you'd have found it funny?"

"Maybe…"

"I might've laughed had Lily not said anything."

Rose nodded.

"I don't think it'd be a bad thing to laugh at this musical. I think a lot of it will have comedic value," said Rosemary, smiling at Rose. The red-haired girl nodded. "And besides," Rosemary added, her smile slowly turning into a wicked grin, "boys like a sense of humour in a girl. If you keep developing yours, you'll be able to date better people than Theodore McLaggen – I'm thinking along the lines of the brother of a pyrotechnic friend that I have…"

"_Hold it_," Hugo said, holding up a hand. "Rose, you dated _McLaggen_?"

Rose, to the shock of everybody except for Lily, Alice and Rosemary, looked sheepish.

"_Why_ did you go and date that git?" James asked, a look of horror on his face.

"You'd better not be joking, Little Rosie-Puff," Fred said warningly to the younger Longbottom.

"I'm not," Rosemary replied, shaking her head vigorously.

"I can't believe you dated McLaggen!" Hugo looked as if he was about to throw up.

"It was just one date!" said Rose. "We went to Hogsmeade together one weekend, when we were in fifth year."

"I can't believe you didn't tell me!"

"Of course I wasn't going to tell you! You'd have hexed him!"

"Aha! So there was a reason to hex him, was there?"

"No, there wasn't. We went out together and our personalities clashed. We decided to not see each other after that. We're still quite friendly with each other."

"Do Mum and Dad know about this?"

"Of course Dad doesn't know, Hugo, don't be stupid. I told Mum, obviously, because I wanted her advice."

"I don't know if I should be disgusted that the two of you ever dated or relieved that you two broke it off early," Scorpius drawled from his end of the couch. There was probably one thing he hated more than Lily Potter – although perhaps 'hate' was becoming a rather strong word – and that was someone with a big personality. Theodore, Lisette and Braxton McLaggen all had big personalities. He'd never met a more unpleasant set of triplets in his life.

"Can we just not talk about Theodore anymore?" Rose asked, getting a little irritated. She really didn't want Scorpius probing into her private affairs, especially as he'd been part of the reason why things hadn't worked out with Theodore. "If you all don't mind, there's a perfectly good musical playing on the wall that I'd like to watch."

**SNAPE: Traditionally, the house with the most points at the end of the year would win the House Cup. However, this year we're doing things a bit differently…**

**He smiled – could that be called a smile? – and looked rather excited at the prospect of whatever was supposed to happen.**

**SNAPE: Here to introduce it is our new professor of the Dark Arts, Professor Quirrell.**

"Professor Quirrell wasn't the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher in 1992!" Louis exclaimed, trying to enlighten the atmosphere in the room.

"How do you know that?" asked Lily.

"Why, my little cousin—"

"I'm not little."

"Whatever. Anyway, the year I started, Professor McGonagall took an interest in the teaching history of Hogwarts—"

"Why?" asked Lysander.

"I suspect that it might have been due to the fact that Peeves had gotten into her office and turned it into a real mess – I remember going to her office with her one day to talk with her about something I'd come across in a book and there was parchment _everywhere_."

"You're waffling, Louis," Lucy spoke up.

"Ah – right. Well, she was quite easily able to sort all the parchment back to where it needed to be. I think she realised though that she had a stupid amount of parchment, so she taught me how to do a binding charm to fashion the employment records into a book. I remember that McGonagall gave me five points because I'd done such a neat job, before placing an expansion charm on it herself so that it gets updated every year. But anyway, to get to my point—"

_Finally_, Scorpius thought.

"—McGonagall let me have a flick through the book and I remember reading: _1991 – Defence Against the Dark Arts – Head of Department: Quirinus Quirrell_. The next page held: _1992 – Defence Against the Dark Arts – Head of Department: Gilderoy Lockhart._"

"How do you remember stuff like that?" Roxanne asked, looking slightly stunned.

"My typical Ravenclaw photographic memory."

"That won't work – I was a Ravenclaw."

"Fine then – I'm a history buff."

"How could it be set in 1992 with such an error?" Molly asked, seeming to understand what Louis had been talking about. "It also couldn't be an assignment for Muggle Studies either – not with a mistake like that. There's no way the students would pass!"

"So what is this, then?" Fred asked.

"I suppose we'll just have to see," Teddy said, changing his hair into vibrant yellow dreadlocks.

**Harry seemed to feel immediate pain.**

**HARRY: Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow…**

**A very peculiar figure entered through the doorway on the side of the stage. Dressed in a long black robe, the person waddled towards centre stage, showing that he had a deep red turban over his head, which also hung over a rather peculiar-looking lump.**

The room erupted into laughter. This musical was great! The fact that no magic was allowed during the production was extremely obvious – just look at the measures the actors were resorting to in order to cover up the person stuck to this Quirrell's back!

"Who is this guy?" Molly asked, clinging onto Roxanne for support as she laughed, as though it might help her to breathe. "He looks positively ridiculous!"

"I don't really understand!" Fred said, doubling over with laughter and almost knocking Lucy over. "Are they _supposed_ to know he's there?"

"I think so," replied James, chuckling madly.

Scorpius shuddered violently in silent laughter in his corner of the couch. He'd hardly been able to believe his eyes when he'd first caught sight of the long-dead professor, who was frozen on the wall due to the group's laughter. As the laughter began to die down, something caught Scorpius' eye and he turned his head to see Lily, who had recovered from her own fit of mirth, watching him with a blank expression on her face. He inwardly groaned as his laughter died, aiding silence to take over the room. He was trying to behave himself! Must she scrutinise his every action?

But Lily's thoughts hadn't been analytical at all.

**Professor Quirrell looked rather small and timid, shuffling slowly into the middle of the room. His fingertips tapped against each other.**

**QUIRRELL: T-the House Cup! A time-honoured t-tradition. For centuries—**

**MALFOY: Go home, terrorist!**

**Professor Quirrell looked slightly startled by the outburst and looked at Malfoy, who looked up and around the room, trying half-heartedly to conceal the smirk on his face as he tried to pretend that it wasn't him who'd yelled the insult.**

"Your father's got _balls_, Malfoy," said Hugo.

Scorpius was about to smile – for Hugo had never said anything positive about his family before – when Fred opened his mouth and ruined it all.

"Or as much as he _can_ have, for a _girl_," Fred chuckled.

Hugo, Fred, and a couple of the other Weasley cousins laughed openly at Fred's joke, clapping him on the back. Everybody else shook their head – still amused, but with more tact than to show it.

Scorpius scowled furiously. Lily watched him with a slight curiosity as he sank further into the couch. What was wrong with him? Why wasn't he reacting like he usually did? It unnerved her a little.

**Professor Quirrell chose to ignore the remark and continued.**

**QUIRRELL: For centuries, the four houses of Hogwarts have competed for the honour and glory of holding the title of House Champion, but where does this tradition come from and what are the roots of the tradition?**

**Hermione raised her hand but didn't bother to wait for Professor Quirrell to call on her, choosing instead to just answer outright.**

**HERMIONE: The House Cup Tournament began with the first generation of Hogwarts students.**

**She looked very pleased. There was a slight pause.**

**QUIRRELL: That was a rhetorical question.**

An idea sprang into Louis' mind. He wondered… What if…?

**Hermione seemed to have, somehow, annoyed Dumbledore.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Granger, quit interrupting. Twenty points from Gryffindor.**

**RON: **_**Thanks**_**, Hermione…**

**QUIRRELL: A-as I was saying, when the tournament first originated it was one of a completely different sort. One champion from each of the four houses would compete in a series of dangerous tasks. Challengers, the winner would not only win the Cup, he would also win eternal glory.**

"That's similar to the 1994 Triwizard Tournament," Molly said. "That was the year after our father left Hogwarts, I remember him telling us about he worked for Barty Crouch."

**HERMIONE: Kind of like a House Cup, or, no, like a Triwizard Tournament?**

_Why, oh why, hadn't Aunt Hermione been in Ravenclaw_? Roxanne asked herself.

**QUIRRELL: Yes, sort of like the Triwizard Tournament… Except, no, not like that at all – there are four houses – how can it be the **_**Tri**_**wizard Tournament with **_**four**_** teams?**

Louis' mind was racing as he took everything in.

**HERMIONE: Well, uh, Professor, if I remember correctly, the House Cup Tournament was disbanded after one semester when one of its students was **_**killed**_** during the first task.**

**Quirrell turned away from Hermione, his fingertips still tapping together.**

**QUIRRELL: Y-yes, it will be very dangerous but the rewards far outweigh the risks.**

Lorcan's mouth dropped.

"Far outweigh the risks?" he repeated. "Does he have a Wrackspurt infestation in his head? Somebody _died!"_

"Yeah, it's a bit odd," Teddy admitted.

**HERMIONE: No, I don't think you heard me, I just said that somebody died!**

**Dumbledore snapped.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Hermione Granger, shut your ungodly lopsided mouth and quit interrupting! Twenty more points!**

**He looked very, very annoyed, to say the least.**

Everybody in the room sat in shock, their mouths wide open. From what they knew of Dumbledore, this outburst was extremely uncharacteristic! He had _valued_ Hermione's mind, not belittled it.

**HARRY & RON: **_**Thanks**_**, Hermione!**

**An awkward silence fell over the stage. Quirrell looked a little uncomfortable.**

**DUMBLEDORE: God! For the cleverest witch of your age you really can be a dumbass sometimes.**

Rose and Hugo's mouth dropped open.

"Excuse me," Hugo cried indignantly, causing the screen to freeze as those sitting around Hermione laughed at her, "our mother is _not_ a dumbass!"

"They can't _hear_ you, Hugo," Rose said, looking at her brother as though he'd gone crazy.

"Of course they can," Hugo replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "This is just like some of the portraits at Hogwarts, where they can talk to you, only it's somehow been captured by this Muggle thing." He gestured to the laptop.

"No, Hugo, they can't," his sister said to him slowly, giving him a scandalised look. "You know, with Hermione Weasley as our mother, I'd have thought – I can't believe you actually—! Oh, I can't look at you right now, you're being so dense."

"If this thing could talk to us, Weasley," Scorpius said, speaking in a bored drawl as he examined his fingernails, "then these people would have answered our questions already – and they would have told _you_ to shut up."

Hugo might have hexed Malfoy, had he not had a point.

"He's right," Lily said through gritted teeth, having earned a nudge from Teddy. "We wouldn't be asking so many questions if these people could talk back to us."

Hugo's mouth dropped.

"You're taking _his_ side?"

"_I'm not!_ I'm just saying he's right!" Lily looked over at the Malfoy. "I hate you, just to remind you," she added. Malfoy shrugged, not caring. Teddy, Victoire and James frowned. This 'family feud' nonsense was all beginning to get a bit old, wasn't it?

**Dumbledore looked quite pleased with himself with his clever attack.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Ooh, ten points to Dumbledore!**

There were chuckles all around the room.

**Quirrell, still looking uncomfortable, decided to continue.**

**QUIRRELL: Yes, yes, it will be very dangerous but the winner will be remembered as a hero for ages to come—**

"He really doesn't seem to care that someone died, does he?" asked Roxanne.

There was no need for anybody to answer her.

**QUIRRELL: —And as the professor for Defence Against the Dark Arts, I believe that this p-practical application is exactly what the curriculum needs, due—**

**SOMETHING: Achoo!**

Everybody froze.

"What was that?" Lorcan asked.

"Something sneezed," his brother replied.

"I _know_ that," Lorcan snapped in return, "thank you, _again._ What I'd _meant_ was that I didn't _see_ anybody sneeze."

"Of course you didn't," said Fred, "they were underneath that ridiculous-looking turban."

"Do you think that was supposed to happen?" asked Hugo.

"Are you serious?" said Rose. "Did that sound remotely like an authentic sneeze to you?"

"Have you ever heard Professor Flitwick sneeze? He sounds like he's just sat down on a spike."

"That's not what I meant."

"Sure it wasn't."

"You two!" cried Alice. "Shut up! It's just a sneeze; we don't need to read too much into it!"

"Yeah, what my girlfriend said!"

"Call me your girlfriend again, Potter, and I'll hex you to Diagon Alley and back."

"Oh, you can punish me any time you like," James said suggestively, winking at her.

"_Petrificus Totalus!_

Everybody laughed as James was frozen to the spot by Alice's spell. His right eye was half-closed in mid-wink and his left hand was halfway up through the air, no doubt in a movement to ruffle his impossible hair. He looked, Fred noted, a bit like one of the house elves that he'd see whenever he snuck into the kitchens at night when he was at Hogwarts.

"Oh you look _so_ much more attractive now," Alice said sweetly, giving him a kick for good measure. James probably would've scowled if he'd been able to move.

**Everybody paused. Dumbledore looked at Quirrell with a curious expression on his face.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Did your turban just sneeze?**

"YES, IT DID!"

"_Hugo!_"

**Quirrell looked slightly nervous, if not taken aback, and backed away a little.**

**QUIRRELL: W-what? No…**

**DUMBLEDORE: I could've sworn I heard a sneeze coming from your direction but your mouth wasn't moving.**

"THAT'S BECAUSE IT WAS THE SPELLOTAPED PERSON ON HIS BACK."

"Hugo, I swear, if you do not shut up _right now_—"

"Oh shut up, Rosie, keep your hair on!"

**Quirrell continued to back away, aiming, it seemed, to move away from Dumbledore and cover his tracks.**

**QUIRRELL: No, tha-that was simply a fart. Excuse me.**

There were chuckles all around the room at the proclamation.

"Nobody in their right mind is going to fall for that," Fred said.

"That much is obvious," Victoire replied.

**Quirrell backed towards the Gryffindor side of the stage, turning his back to Harry, when—**

**TURBAN: Achoo!**

**But as Quirrell continued to back towards Harry, the latter's scar appeared to flair in pain.**

**HARRY: Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Oh, geez! Oh, my God, ow!**

"Whoever wrote this musical could not have been any plainer in their meaning just now," Louis said, a small smile on his face as he raised an eyebrow.

"What do you mean?" Dominique asked.

"Oh, as if you haven't figured it out already!"

"Excuse me, I've been _watching_ the play, not analysing it!"

"What? How else are we supposed to figure out its purpose?"

"Louis," Dominique started, "right now, I don't really care about its purpose. It's funnier than anything I've ever seen before, so all I want to do is enjoy it."

Her words almost silenced her younger brother, who turned around to the wall-turned-screen in a sulk, muttering, "You're a lousy Ravenclaw."

**Quirrell made to hastily escape to the side of the stage, as Harry brought his fingertips to his forehead.**

**QUIRRELL: I must be going.**

**HARRY: Ow! Ow!**

**TURBAN: Achoo!**

**QUIRRELL: Simply farted once more, excuse me!**

**Ginny and Neville looked curiously after the now-absent professor, possibly wondering what was going on. While Ginny kept turning to see where Professor Quirrell had gone, Neville turned to look at Harry, who seemed to be in much better condition. Ron had a suspicious look on his face, as if he knew that something wasn't quite right, and slowly brought his food to his mouth.**

The scene the group had just witnessed had been peppered with chuckles and giggles from all except James, who was still quite frozen in mid-wink.

"Alright there, mate?" Albus asked his older brother mockingly, patting him on the back.

_You wait until you take this jinx off, Longbottom_, James thought, obviously still unable to move. _You just wait._

**Dumbledore seemed to decide that whatever had just happened should not interrupt the topic at hand.**

**DUMBLEDORE: With the newly resurrected House Cup, a champion from each house will be selected to compete! So, Snape, would you do us the honours, please?**

**Snape came out with a 'House Cup' that looked suspiciously as if it were made from yellow cardboard.**

"Couldn't they have used one of the trophies from the Trophy Room?" Rosemary said, causing the musical to pause. "They're not used for anything except detentions."

"And what would our innocent Little Rosie-Puff know about detention?" Fred grinned devilishly, poking the poor Longbottom girl. "Hufflepuffs need more than simple misbehaviour to get themselves into trouble."

"Are you saying that I'm not smart enough to get a detention?"

"No, I'm saying that Hufflepuffs fail at everything they do."

"You—! I work _really hard_, thank you very much—"

"Ah, yes," said Fred airily, waving his hand lazily in the air, "the Hufflepuff trait of hard work – _obviously_ something that we can't overlook. You see, Little Rosie-Puff, you can work as hard as you like – you'll still fail."

At this, Rosemary launched herself at Fred in an uncharacteristic show of violence. The yelling must have made quite a bit of noise, for soon footsteps could be heard from the floor above and a moment later, George Weasley stuck his head through the basement door.

"Everything all right down there?" he asked, angling his head to try and get a better view.

"Yes," everyone chorused. They must have sounded too innocent, because the older man raised an eyebrow suspiciously and looked further into the room. What he saw made him laugh loudly.

His son was on his back on the floor, sat upon by none other than Rosemary Longbottom. Alice had grabbed a hold on her younger sister's shirt, but the action appeared to have been ineffective. Rosemary's fist was halfway to Fred's face, his hands acting as a shield. The Scamander twins looked like they were trying to intervene as well: one of them – George wasn't too sure which – was pushing Fred down while the other pushed Rosemary away. Roxanne had obviously chosen not to help her brother, being firmly planted on the couch – clearly whatever had happened was Fred's fault, but that wasn't anything unusual. James Potter looked like a fly had gone up his nose… only he wasn't moving. George Weasley thought about undoing the spell which had been so neatly performed on his nephew but then decided that he had better things to do.

"Hmm…" he said, looking at the scene in front of him. "Carry on, then." He promptly left.

"Come on, Rosemary, get off him," said Alice, pulling her sister off the poor Weasley.

"I've really had enough of his taunting," Rosemary said, scowling at Fred.

"He's just messing around," Hugo told her, gently tugging on the back of his cousin's top, pulling him back.

"Messing around is what _you_ do when you're with your girlfriend, Weasley," Rosemary snapped viciously. She went to a corner of the rug in a huff, not realising what she'd just done. Another sixteen pairs of eyes turned to Hugo, who was flushing magnificently.

"We won't be talking about this," he said through gritted teeth, turning back to the odd-looking Professor Snape on the wall. The rest of the room – sans James, of course – grumbled collectively as they turned their attention back to the musical.

**Snape walked to the centre of the stage.**

**SNAPE: Yes, Headmaster… First, from the Ravenclaw house…**

**He pulled out a piece of light yellow paper.**

**SNAPE: …a Miss Cho Chang!**

**Cho Chang looked absolutely thrilled and stood up.**

**CHO: Oh mah Gahd, I won! I can't really thank all o' y'all!**

**She sat down and Professor Snape continued to announce the Champions.**

**SNAPE: Next, from Hufflepuff… a Mr Cedric Diggory…**

**Cedric, too, stood up, a charming smile in place.**

**CEDRIC: Well, I don't **_**find**_** this surprising at all!**

Several people snorted in laughter.

**Snape raised his eyebrows quickly, smiling, as though pretending to share Cedric's enthusiasm.**

**CHO: I find it perfect. Now I can spend more time with my beloved boyfriend!**

**Cedric touched her shoulders and kissed her.**

**CEDRIC: I'm glad as well, my darling!**

**There were looks of disgust exchanged between Harry and Ron, as the latter shook his head in disdain.**

"I think," started Lucy, "that these people are going to be _the_ cheesiest Wizarding couple throughout the entire play."

"Yeah, I agree," Lorcan replied, "so let's hope that they don't make us sick with it."

**SNAPE: And next, from the Slytherin house…**

**He pulled another piece of yellowed paper from the back of the "Cup".**

**SNAPE: …Draco Malfoy…**

There were a couple of "Eughs" from some of the people sitting on the rug. Scorpius shot them a look, which they didn't see.

**Malfoy stood up suddenly, making victorious noises as he looked over at Harry.**

**MALFOY: I finally beat you, didn't I, Potter!**

**He strutted over to the Gryffindor side of the stage, grabbing Harry and shaking him slightly.**

**MALFOY: What do you think of that, huh? I'm the champion this time!**

**He fell onto the floor ungraciously, but got back up and half-twirled to his seat.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Draco, would you sit down, you little shit? The Champion's just a title.**

Everybody turned to look at Scorpius, who had turned slightly pink.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't—"

"Shut up, Weasley," Scorpius snapped, looking at Fred.

"Dumbledore was never wrong, Malfoy," Fred replied in a voice pretending to be wise. "If he says that your father was a little shit, then he was a little shit!"

"That," Scorpius pointed to the frozen image on the wall, "is _not_ Dumbledore and that is _not_ my father."

"Oh, yes, that's right," Dominique joined in, taunting him, "because that's a girl up there, isn't it?"

"And that's worse," said Roxanne, shaking her head in mock sadness, "because that means that whoever chose these people to play our parents looked at that girl and said, 'You know, what? You'd make a perfect Malfoy.'"

"That person up there is nothing like my father," Scorpius scowled, slumping into his corner of the couch.

"Come on, guys, leave him alone," Teddy said, trying to put a stop to it. Scorpius felt somewhat grateful, but he knew that Teddy was probably chuckling internally. The chatter died down, although the Malfoy boy could have sworn he'd heard the Potter girl mutter, "It's not like he doesn't deserve it."

**SNAPE: And finally, from the Gryffindor house…**

**Snape pulled a fourth piece of paper from the back of the Cup and, looking at the name, appeared to be somewhat excited.**

**SNAPE: Oh my… Well, isn't this **_**cuuuurious…**_

"It's Uncle Harry," Rose stated bluntly amongst the chuckles at Snape's voice.

"We all know that," Louis replied.

**SNAPE: The one person in all of Hogwarts who I've a well-known grudge against is suddenly in a tournament where he may very well lose his life…**

"He doesn't have to look so excited," said Albus scornfully. Namesake or not, this idea of Severus Snape was one he wasn't particularly enjoying.

**Neville stood up quickly.**

**NEVILLE: I-if, if it's me, I-I'll I'll just make m-myself re-responsible right now for G-Gryffindor losing—**

**SNAPE: Sit down you inarticulate bubble.**

"Aww, poor Dad!" said Alice, looking sympathetically at the wall.

**SNAPE: It's Harry Potter!**

**There were claps and cheers around most of the stage – the loudest coming from Ron, who looked up from whatever it was he was eating to shout about half a dozen cheers, before going back to his food.**

**DUMBLEDORE: Well, here they are, folks, the four Hogwarts Champions. I want all of you to start preparing immediately because the first task is in two months and it could be anything… So let's get to it!**

**Dumbledore have a little chuckle and then walked away. Everybody got up to leave, the Ravenclaws cheering for their House Champion.**

**PANSY AND LAVENDER: Cho Chang, Cho Chang, Cho Chang!**

**Malfoy, too, had tried to start a chant for himself, but didn't get very far. **

**MALFOY: Malfoy, Malfoy, Malfoy, Mal-Malfoy… Hey…!**

**The screen faded to black once more.**

"Well, that was entertaining," Victoire said, breaking the silence that had taken over for a moment. There were murmurs of agreement around the room.

"I, for one, am sure that I know why the musical as a whole doesn't make a lot of sense," Louis announced. The room turned to him, curious as to what he had to say.

"Come on, then. What is it?" Lily asked when her cousin showed no inclination to continue.

"It's a parody," he said simply. The room was filled with gasps as most of them understood what it was that he was talking about; it turned into chatter divided into two halves: Lucy and Roxanne explaining to Lorcan and Lysander how it was a parody (as they had no real understanding of Harry's years at Hogwarts) and the rest discussing the conflicting facts which had arisen during the course of the musical so far. James sat, still frozen, completely forgotten until—

"_Finite Incantatem._"

As James fell to the floor, unused to being able to move, everyone turned to look in surprise at the person who had lifted Alice's spell.

Scorpius Malfoy looked at everybody, his wand still raised in the air, slightly uncomfortable and wholeheartedly wishing he hadn't just performed the act of kindness.

"Thanks, Malfoy," James said, shaking his head to clear the fuzz that had begun to fog up his mind. _Perhaps Nargles really do exist,_ he thought absentmindedly.

"Stop staring," Scorpius muttered, scowling once more.

"Yeah, come on, guys," said James, trying to cheer up the atmosphere a little. "You all look as if you're beginning to fancy him." Everybody immediately looked away. Scorpius rolled his eyes, not missing the glare that Lily quickly shot back his way.

"And speaking of fancy," James continued, a grin forming on his face, "Hugo, I believe there is something that you might like to tell us."

His cousin cursed as the unnerving gaze of his relatives and friends turned to him – Scorpius didn't bother, already knowing who Hugo was dating – although Hugo himself didn't know that someone he disliked so greatly held this little piece of information.

"Yes, little brother," Rose said, looking quite interestedly at Hugo, "after having a go at me for _supposedly_ dating Finnegan—" she shot a look at Rosemary, who grinned sheepishly "—and for going out _once_ with Theodore, I'd like to know who it is that has placed you in such a state of hypocrisy as this."

Hugo said nothing, but glared at the floor.

"Yeah, Hugo," Dominique grinned. "What's her name?"

Once again, he said nothing.

"You _have_ to tell us now, Hugo," Teddy said teasingly. "After all, weren't you the one who first discovered when Victoire and I were engaged?"

"That was different," Hugo muttered.

"We hardly think so," said Victoire, leaning into her husband.

"So, tell us," said the Scamander twins in unison. Both of them, for eleven-year-olds, seemed rather interested to learn that he was dating someone.

"Hugo, you listen to me, _this instant_," Rose commanded. Her brother looked up at her, scowling. "If you don't tell us, I will go upstairs right now and announce to our parents, as well as everybody else up there, that you're seeing someone. You know how they'll react to that."

"How will they react to that?" asked Alice excitedly.

"They'll tell our grandparents."

"That doesn't sound so bad."

"It does when Grandmother Weasley will have the wedding planned within two weeks."

"Alright, alright!" came Hugo's exasperated yell. "Her name is Monica."

There were murmurs of approval. They couldn't recall anyone by the name of Monica, so they were sure that she couldn't be so bad.

"Monica…?"

"That's none of your business."

"Oh _come on_," Roxanne pleaded, "you _have_ to tell us more than her first name!"

"Yeah," said Fred, "like, what house is she in?"

"The girl's house is hardly important, Fred," replied Teddy.

"It is if she's in Slytherin, she might be a git like Malfoy."

"Hey, who said she was a witch?" Rosemary said, shrugging her shoulders.

"You're dating a _Muggle_?" Louis' voice sounded in awe. Alice sat up a little straighter.

"No," grumbled Hugo, "Rosemary's just messing around again." The Hufflepuff was hit by half a dozen cushions. "She _is_ a witch – a Muggleborn witch."

"Well she can't be in Slytherin, then."

"We have several Muggleborns in Slytherin, Weasley."

"Suuuuure you do, Malfoy."

Scorpius shook his head and rolled his eyes.

"That aside," said Molly, "who is she?"

"Or do I have to ask my sister for the details?" Alice threatened.

Hugo groaned angrily.

"Fine!" he yelled. "Her name is Monica. Monica Forrester."

"What house is she in?" asked Fred.

"Gryffindor."

"Does she play Qudditch?" James asked.

"She just made Chaser this year. She's quite good."

"Does she do well in her classes?" asked Lucy.

"Average, I guess."

"So what are her favourites then?"

"Defence Against the Dark Arts… and Charms… I think."

The questions continued for the better half of an hour as they asked Hugo everything that they could think to ask him. How long had they been dating? (Since the beginning of the school year.) Did she keep an owl? (Yes and a bloody protective thing it was.) What was her favourite thing to eat? (She always seemed to be eating a kind of long, red Muggle sweet that a friend of hers kept sending via the post.) Did she have any brothers or sisters? (Two sisters, non-magical.) Everyone seemed rather pleased with Hugo's account of his new girlfriend, until Lily remembered something that was somewhat important.

"Hey, wait a moment – Rosemary, you said that you already knew that they were dating. How?"

Rosemary grinned. Hugo turned bright red, something which did not go unnoticed by everybody.

"Well, you see," Rosemary started, grinning, "when you sneak into the Gryffindor common room during dinner to set up a prank in your sister's room—"

"You tried to do what?"

"Shush, Alice, you're taking away my spotlight. Like I said, when you sneak into the common room to play a prank on your sister and her friends and you see your classmate making out with a good family friend of yours, it pretty much tells you all you need to know."

The room went into uproar.

"Wait a moment – _your classmate?"_ asked Fred.

"Rosemary's only fourteen!"

"Yeah, but—" Hugo was cut off.

"So _that's_ why you skipped dinner so many times…" Alice said, nodding as everything made sense and ignoring the chaos around her. "And to think that you said that you were in library studying! No wonder you told me I couldn't study with you!"

"You're dating a fourteen-year-old?"

"What! That's gross!"

"No, it's not like th—"

"Since when did the two of you start studying together?" asked James, frowning at Alice and his cousin, also seemingly unaware of the pandemonium.

"There's no reason why you should care, Potter," Alice replied, nonchalant.

"The hell there isn't."

"Fourteen! Are you out of your _mind_, Hugo?"

"She's not—"

"Guys, relax!" Rosemary shouted, calming everyone immediately. "Monica's in fourth year, yeah, but she's fifteen – Hugo is sixteen – there's really not a lot of harm to it."

The room seemed to settle a lot easier at the revelation of this little fact.

"Well…" Teddy scratched his head, changing his hair to his natural black cut.

"I suppose congratulations are in order!" Fred grinned, grabbing a hold of Hugo's hand and shaking it profusely.

"Congratulations for what?"

Everybody froze and turned to the door. Neville Longbottom and his wife were standing in the doorway, having come down to see what the ruckus was about. Hugo cringed. If anybody told Neville or Hannah about Hugo's girlfriend, they'd tell his parents… who would tell his grandparents… and then before he knew it, Monica would be invited to spend Christmas and summer with his family. It wasn't that he didn't like Monica – he adored her – but she wasn't quite ready for The Weasley Experience.

Luckily for Hugo, James came to his rescue.

"Didn't you hear? Alice and I are aiming for a June wedding."

Neville squeaked as Hannah raised an eyebrow – Alice frequently wrote to her during the school year and her daughter's disdain for the Potter boy had always been evident.

"YOU IDIOT!" Alice screeched, jumping off the couch and tackling him. "DIDN'T YOU LEARN ANYTHING IN THE LAST HOUR?"

"I have reinforced my belief that our love is meant to be—"

"YOU'RE SUCH A GIT!"

"You're only twice as lovely when you're angry!"

Her father squeaked again and practically ran from the room.

"MUM, DON'T LISTEN TO HIM!"

Hannah Longbottom only winked at her eldest daughter, relieving her of any worry, and left for upstairs, saying something about "damage control". As soon as the door closed there was a sickening CRACK! as Alice's fist collided with James' face. It took Teddy, Louis and Scorpius to pull her off him.

"JAMES POTTER, I HATE YOU!"

"You won't if you go out with me, Longbottom."

Alice shrieked as James teased her, grinning despite having a cut lip. Everybody looked around nervously. The tension between Alice and James felt wobbly, as though the former's anger was made somewhat less effective with the latter's attitude.

Suddenly, a 'plunk' came from the Muggle contraption that they'd all momentarily forgotten about.

"Oh, what's this? The next part of the play is starting," Albus said nervously, trying to draw attention away from James and his object of affection. Thankfully, it worked. Everybody re-shifted their position where they were sitting and tried to relax as the next scene played out in front of them.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note: So, what do y'all think? Did you like it? Love it? Weren't too impressed? Wanted to throw someone out of the astronomy tower and then drown them in the lake? You can tell me whatever you like by clicking "REVIEW" just below - it honestly makes my day to get those emails.<strong>

**One thing I thought I'd address: one of my reviews, Vitzy, asked me why Scorpius was at the Potter household if nobody liked him.**

**Answer: None of the Potter children are particularly fond of Scorpius. The Weasleys &c. are split into two categories: those who don't like him and those who don't particularly care either way. Teddy is a bit of an exception - he likes everybody. I actually wrote a one-shot as to why and how Scorpius winds up at the Potter household. I'd considered publishing it before "A Rather Unusual Holidays" but then I thought it might give too much away, so I decided not to. I do intend to publish it, though it will probably be once this story ends.**

**If you have any other questions, feel free to ask them in your review! :) You can ask anything you like, whether it's "Will we see such-and-such?" or "What do you like to eat on toast?" You can even offer me lessons on salsa dancing if you wish!**

**Just remember, feedback means the world to every writer. 3**


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